


Mind Games

by heliocentrics



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi (2017), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Endgame, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Force Soulmates, I'm honestly making this up as I go, Implied Relationships, Just need 2 get this reylo shit off my chest, Post-TLJ, Slow Burn, building on force conversations r & b had, episode IX predictions???, honestly its reylo when it is not a slow burn, leading up to end-game, mental bond, ok maybe more of just a slow-ish burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-29
Updated: 2018-04-08
Packaged: 2019-02-23 11:23:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 29,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13189032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heliocentrics/pseuds/heliocentrics
Summary: You and me, we've always been alone,always. Maybe it's why the Force connected us after all that time. But now we don't have to be alone anymore.The connection Rey and Ben Solo have transforms into something neither of them can control or understand. Two sides of one coin, prophesized to bring peace and balance, must coordinate their destiny as the fight between Resistance and First Order, between good and evil, comes to a head. (Set after the events of TLJ, exploring Rey and Ben's relationship leading up to sequel trilogy endgame.)





	1. I

**Author's Note:**

> [UPDATE 7/2/18]: It's been a long long time since I last updated this fic, and even longer since I started it. My appreciation and love for SW and reylo has only grown since writing this, as well as my writing skills, especially writing in canonverse. I've considered orphaning/deleting this work in the past, but despite the issues I have with it, I'm choosing to keep it up as a reminder that I can finish multichaps, and will again in the future! However, if you stumble across this fic, feel free to read it but **_please know_** it does not reflect my writing skills today, and I would also refer you to my other, imo better works. Thanks!!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _She had killed the idea of Kylo Ren in her mind and replaced him with Ben Solo, the lonely son of Rebellion heroes who could return to the Light. But after Crait... she wasn't sure who Ben was._

She still felt him inside her head. It was almost constant now.

 Before they had touched hands, what seemed like years ago, his presence in her mind had been spotty, only coming to her attention when he called himself to the forefront, and they would speak. She would be training, sitting in her shack on Ahch-To, or walking alone, and he would appear to her, as real as if he were standing next to her. They would speak, briefly, and his presence would wink out of her sight, leaving only a memory that was difficult to erase. Yet, although he took up space in her thoughts, in her memories, she couldn’t feel him there. Thinking of him didn’t summon him into her mind. After Snoke’s death, though, and the consequential events on Crait… their link had been different.

 Rey shook her head to clear the goosebumps from her arms, returning herself to the present. She was lingering in the doorway of the _Falcon_ ’s rear cargo hold, which had been repurposed to accommodate the two dozen rebels that remained in the Resistance. Normally, it held five or six people, who slept in bedrolls on the floor and kept their things stacked in storage closets or along the walls- the _Falcon_ was only equipped to house five or six people. Now, however, the bedrolls had been cleared aside, and Poe Dameron stood alongside General Leia at the front of the hold. The twenty-five other passengers accompanying them, save Chewie in the cockpit, sat on the floor, listening attentively and speaking up without hesitation.

“Now, initially our plan was to return to Coruscant and conduct Reconnaissance to recover former Republic sympathizers- those in the Senate who were allied to our cause.” Poe’s posture was commanding, despite his average stature, and his tone kept the attention of everyone in earshot. “However, Leia has it on good authority that the First Order have their grip tight on the core worlds- to bring the Resistance’s last members there would be suicide. So, with the help of Lieutenant Connix, we’ve assessed the condition of a few former Rebellion bases...”

Rey tuned out, observing faces and postures more than the words Poe and Leia said as they brainstormed plans. She studied Finn, back against a storage closet by one of the walls, eyes trained on Poe. Rose sat next to him, her hair a frizzy halo framing her face, playing with a strand as she listened. She had grown to recognize everyone on the ship in the three long days they had been traveling; the _Falcon_ wasn’t exactly a cruiser, and quarters were cramped. After years with a whole, lonely desert to herself, she liked the company, even if she had to ask people for their names two or three times.

As she studied Leia’s face, she inevitably found her thoughts drifting back to his presence, that constant black cloud in the back of her mind. At first, she was perplexed by this thing, this separate and conscious force existing in her head. She had recognized it as Ben as soon as it began to emit errant waves of quiet rage, which hadn’t taken long. Initially, she had been able to ignore these currents of emotion, running so distinct and different from her own, but the more she refused to acknowledge it, the bigger it became. The night after Crait, she had been sitting in the cockpit alone while Chewie slept, and an overwhelming swell of agony and sorrow hit her so hard it took her breath away. Finn had wandered in to find her sobbing inexplicably and inconsolably. She had only been able to mouth the words “It’s him. Not me. It’s him.” before waving him away. The rage was more common, and easier for her to control. Even when she felt him having an outburst of anger across the bond, she could clench her fist or grit her teeth, and was balanced again. 

She picked at her fingernails, their tips still caked with dirt from Ahch-To, as Leia droned on. When she had first felt him there, she worried that he could read her thoughts, that he would glean their location from her stream of consciousness, track them down, and kill them. However, as the hours passed, and she felt more blind emotion than dictated thought from him, she figured their bond had transformed into something based more on emotion. There was always the possibility that Ben had somehow crafted a safeguard in the Force that kept her from reading his thoughts while allowing him full access to his own, but it was becoming more and more unlikely he possessed anymore capacity with the Force than she did. The remnants of Anakin Skywalker’s lightsaber, split down the middle and now lying at the bottom of her satchel, were constant proof of that. 

Sighing, Rey turned away from the cargo hold and into the empty corridor. She knew it was tactless to abandon the meeting, and this was probably information she needed, but she couldn’t force herself to concentrate. After her defense and subsequent rescue of the last flame of the Resistance, most on board had heralded her as a hero, shaking her hand and thanking her profusely. Poe and Finn both agreed she could use this to her benefit, soaring to a secure leadership position in the Rebellion, and potentially the New Republic. Leia had concurred with the boys, pleading with Rey that the people of the Resistance, the people of the galaxy, needed her. The idea of that responsibility, of becoming a figurehead for an entire movement, had overwhelmed her, and she had tried to avoid the subject ever since. Being the Resistance’s final competent force user had been nerve-wracking enough; she didn’t want any undue light shed on her. 

She found herself wandering the short distance towards the cockpit, hoping to relieve Chewie from piloting the spacecraft. Since leaving Crait, she shared her quarters with Connix, Rose, and a few others sleeping on what little floor space the room provided. She seldom found any solace there, even when the room was empty. Besides, she knew her mind would wander no matter where she was or what she was doing; she figured she might as well keep herself busy up at the cockpit.  

Chewbacca was keeping busy tracing old Republic maps to allied worlds through a computer on the dashboard. A porg had nestled into his shoulder without his knowing, sleeping soundly while he worked. She reached over to untangle the animal from Chewie’s fur, earning a grunt of surprise from the Wookiee and a squeal of indignation from the porg, who ran across the dash and under a compartment.

“I can take over for you.” Rey said, taking the seat opposite him. “Leia and Poe are having some sort of Resistance meeting- you should join them.”

Chewie left with a quiet roar, edging around a nest of porgs and out of the cockpit, leaving Rey alone. She brought her feet up to rest on the seat, her knees up by her chest. She sighed, tracing the label for the vent exhaust control button with one finger, her chin resting on her kneecaps. Inevitably, a memory resurfaced from what seemed so long ago, of her and Han Solo, a hero turned friend, sailing through the air in Takodana, settling near Maz Kanata’s castle. They hadn’t shared more than a week together, but the hours they shared blended into something more than companionship for her. When Ben had just been Kylo Ren to her, he had told her Han would have disappointed her, that she was looking for a father figure in anyone. He had been right, in a way, but had that really been her mind searching for a father? What if Han had been looking for a daughter in her?

The back of her head fell against the pilot’s seat, and she stared up at the ceiling, rife with loose wires and the remnants of porg nests. The stars stretched out, endless around her, and she couldn’t seem to escape her past. Memories of Jakku and Ahch-To and Crait and everything in between bounced around in her head. Dozens of people were with her on the _Falcon_ now, but she still felt so isolated here. A sense of loneliness, and melancholy, resonated with her, and without thinking she let it trickle down the bond she shared with Ben. To her surprise, it met an empty void of numbness. Rey wondered absently what he was doing in that moment, parsecs away from her. 

She heard a sound, her senses attuned to the Force, and she whipped her head around to see Leia making her way into the cockpit, a tired smile gracing her lips. She settled into the chair next to Rey, her eyes grazing briskly over the various wheels and buttons decorating the controls. “Even after all these years, I still wonder how I ever learned to work this thing.” She chuckled under her breath.

Rey shared her smile, breaking eye contact to look out among the stars they drifted past. 

“For what it’s worth, I think you should have stayed and listened to the discussion we all had. I know you would have brought up some good points.” Rey heard Leia speak next to her, as if she were talking to herself, but when she turned to face her Leia was looking expectantly for a response.

Rey sighed, turning back to the controls. “I’m not sure I would have— I’m not good at this whole Resistance thing.” She looked down at calloused hands.

“I know that’s not true. You’re the reason any of us are alive in the first place.”

“So I have a talent for saving everyone at the last moment.”

“It’s a useful talent to have!”

Rey laughed under her breath, dropping her head again. “I just… I don’t have a mind for strategy. Maybe it’s the Force, but… it’s easier for me to do, rather than think. When I strategize, it just muddles up the plans that already exist in my head.” 

“You’re starting to sound like Luke. And B-“ Leia stopped herself, patting Rey on her shoulder, the ghost of a smile on her lips. “But I know everyone would have appreciated you being there.”  

“I’m not ready to be the symbol of a movement.” Rey swallowed. “I don’t like the idea of people turning to me for inspiration.”

“It’s not so much about that. People like Poe and me are here to make the tough decisions. When people see someone like _you_ fighting alongside them, it reassures them. It was the same way with Luke, during the days of the Empire. It’s about solidarity, about fighting as one.”

Rey shrugged. “I suppose.” She was eager for a change in topic, and settled on one easily. “The meeting— have we decided where we’re going?”

Leia made a face. “It’s hard for us to agree on something. With as few numbers as we have, many of us think it’s smarter for us to bunker down and wait for the allies and sympathizers to come to us. Let the rumors a weak First Order spread, and organize rebellion on a scale bigger than a handful of fighters in the meantime.”

“But why not find an ally to bunker down with?” Rey’s brow knitted together. “If we coordinate with allied planetary governments now, it would make organization easier. We’d have more resources, more weapons, more manpower.”

Leia wagged a finger at her. “This is what I’m talking about. If you had been there to say this, we might have settled it at that.” She began to stand, placing a wrinkled hand on the control board for support. “For now, you can plot a course for Bespin, in the Outer Rim— we’ve got open invitations to take shelter there from some former friends. If plans change, I’ll let you know.” 

Rey smiled behind her as Leia left, leaving her alone with her thoughts again. She plotted the course for Bespin absently, her mind occupied with her conversation with Leia. Could she really serve as a symbol for the Resistance? Leia spoke openly about her likeness to Luke, but Rey didn’t know if she could even consider herself a Jedi. Was she even fully aligned with the Light? 

She had killed the idea of Kylo Ren in her mind and replaced him with Ben Solo, the lonely son of Rebellion heroes who could return to the Light. But after Crait... she wasn't sure  _who_ Ben was. But a small part of her that was difficult to ignore missed their candid conversations, connected by a thread light years away from each other. His concept of a new galaxy, devoid of Empires or Rebellions of First Orders, had scared her; she couldn't bring herself to let her friends die. But she wished he could have listened. 

It was hard for both of them to acknowledge that they were all each other had left.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ben POV happening next chapter folks... again I'm making this up as I go so archive warnings and ratings will change as the story goes on. Thank u 4 reading!!


	2. II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _He hadn't realized that he would have to juggle his relationship with the Force, with the people on that ship, and the responsibility of Supreme Leadership. He couldn't have chosen a role if a blaster was at his temple; apprentice turned Force master, son turned enemy, or commander turned Leader._

For someone who had praised the benefit of disregarding immaterial possessions unrelated to the Force, Supreme Leader Snoke had kept lavish quarters on board the _Supremacy_.

When the officer led him to Snoke’s old rooms, citing an issue regarding his recent change in leadership, Kylo Ren hadn’t known what to expect. He had always trained with Snoke, spoken with him, in his audience chamber, surrounded by Praetorian guards. He’d barely given a thought to where Snoke slept, ate, and bathed. He didn’t even know if Snoke ever did any of things to begin with. Snoke had almost always seemed like an otherworldly, almost godlike being, who didn’t bother with the burdens of mortals. But Ren always knew he could be killed.

“Your new quarters, befitting your rank, sir. Supreme Leader.” The officer was quick in correcting himself before nodding and scurrying from the room.

It had only taken one peek into the front room for him to know that this wasn’t for him. The wall opposite him was a floor to ceiling window, depicting nondescript stars and the mineral planet below the _Supremacy_. Lavish sofas draped in fabrics of deep velvet red and burnished gold decorated the long room, and priceless artifacts from countless cultures across the galaxy decorated the perimeter. He would have laughed to himself, if the sight hadn’t felt so… disappointing to him.

“No. Come back.” Ren’s voice was short and clipped, and the officer wasted no time returning to his master. “You can pass these on to General Hux, if he’s willing to accept them.”

“…Sir?”

“I don’t need the rooms of a dead man to remind me of my power.” To drive the point home, Ren used the force to shove the door closed. “How Snoke chose to decorate his quarters is of no interest to me. I’ll be staying in my old rooms.”

“Yes, Supreme Leader,” The officer squeaked, but Kylo Ren was already moving, down the hall and towards a lift back to the bridge. Hux was busy coordinating efforts on tracking down the last remnants of the Resistance as the repaired  _Supremacy_ idled above Crait, but Ren didn’t trust the mission to go off smoothly without his supervision.

He walked briskly towards the bridge, ignoring anyone crossing his path. A few stormtroopers were walking by on patrol, and they did a double take as he stalked past. The lift was ready and waiting, and the door shut behind him with a satisfying whizz as he entered.

A crackled voice came on over the intercom. “Sir, General Hux is requesting your presence back on the bridge.”

“I’m nearly there. Tell him to stop being so impatient.” Ren slammed his thumb on the red button controlling internal comms. 

Ren studied the white lights and dark metal decorating the lift, and recalled the ride to Snoke’s old throne room, with her. _I saw your future. Solid, and clear._  Part of him ached to return to the throne room, return to the setting of battle he fought with her. He still wondered if it had been Snoke who had connected them, or if he had been taking credit for the Force’s work. It wouldn’t be the first time it had happened. If Snoke had really connected them, Ren thought the link would sever after his death. But still he felt her in his mind, even now, a white spark in the back of his head. And Snoke was definitely dead.

The door snapped open, revealing a bridge buzzing with activity. Ren wiped his mind of emotion, keeping his eyes on Hux as he descended towards the front of the room. “General?” 

“We’ve been able to intercept and decode the return messages from the distress signal. They’re not being redirected anywhere.”

“So their ship isn’t receiving these signals. We already knew that.” Ren walked past the general and down the bridge, positioning himself behind a map of their surrounding space. “You have information on the messages themselves?”

“No new allies present in the return messages; these are all known sympathizers with the Resistance. I have a list of responses— it’s possible the _Falcon_ is plotting a course to one of them.”

Ren grit his teeth, trying and failing to soothe his frustration with the man in front of him. “General, if they didn’t receive these responses, I doubt they’ll be accepting invitations they’ve never read. Traveling to planets that were too late in responding.” HIs words were a hiss.

“Right. Of course, sir.” Hux’s pasty complexion made his blush stand out, bright red on milky white.

“…Is this why you called me?” Ren looked over his shoulder to Hux, not bothering to conceal the silent rage in his eyes. “To discuss codified responses?”

“No, sir. Officers decoding the responses found a comms address number mixed in with the messages. It’s possible the distress signal sent by the Resistance relayed the number for further communications once they left the base. We ran the address through our systems, but there’s been no ship or planet associated with it.”

“Of course there hasn’t. Han Solo would have kept the comms address of his freighter off the books, unregulated.” Ren ignored and shoved down the pang of conflicted sorrow that always accompanied inevitable memories of his late father. “Can you track its location?”

“No, sir. We’ve tracked it, but-“ 

“No response.” Ren finished the sentence of his inferior, his brow furrowing as his mind worked. “They must be in hyperspace, or taken their comms offline. Keep tracking the address— if any messages are sent or received, inform me immediately. That’s an order.” He turned on a heel, heading back towards the lift and, inevitably, towards the throne room that pulled on him still. He didn’t wait to see the insolent bow from a seething General Hux, or hear the shaky exhale of breath from the officers seated at workstations around the bridge.

The lift whirred as it carried Kylo Ren back to the higher floors of the _Supremacy_. He should have felt sure of himself, sure in the decision to track down the _Falcon_. But the truth was, the part of him that Snoke had fostered and created had spoken when Hux had reported on the comms address. He should have kept his mouth shut, let Hux infer what he would from the information gleaned on Crait, and left it at that.

_I don’t know if I want to destroy that ship._

The thought terrified him. Indecision and unwelcome conflict had plagued him his entire life, but this new revelation was crippling. He bowed his head, biting his lip as his mind sped. He hadn't realized that he would have to juggle his relationship with the Force, with the people on that ship, and the responsibility of Supreme Leadership. He couldn't have chosen a role if a blaster was at his temple; apprentice turned Force master, son turned enemy, or commander turned Leader.

However he felt now, events had been set in motion that he couldn’t undo. The _Falcon_ would have to jump out of hyperspace, or bring comms online to land, eventually, and when it did, the First Order would know where it was and how to destroy it. It would look suspicious if Ren didn’t order the _Supremacy_ , or some other Star Destroyer, to track down and eliminate the ship. Once the First Order was on the tail of the _Falcon_ , everyone on that ship was all but dead.

Including Rey.

The lift shuddered as it entered the top floors, heading straight for Snoke’s receiving room. He knew from damage reports that the room had been untouched by maintenance or defense since Rey and he had killed Snoke and eight Praetorian guards. He remembered the battle with a twisted fondness; Praetorian guards had been venerated as fearsome defenders of the First Order’s foremost leader, and Ren had always yearned to battle them. They had put up more of a fight than he had anticipated.

The door whizzed open to reveal a room that was still in shambles, untouched from when Hux had come to retrieve him for the assault on Crait. The red lining of the windows and walls was ash on the glass floors. Snoke’s body had been retrieved and disposed of by stormtroopers on Ren's orders, but the corpses of the Praetorians still laid where they had fallen, their weapons sputtering. 

In those few minutes, when the two of them had fought side by side to kill eight guards, Kylo Ren had felt more powerful, more attuned to the Force than he ever had. Initially, he thought Snoke’s death had stoked his power, but the more he thought on it, the more he knew; that power came from her. Together, united as one, they took down those guards. Separated, they would have died in this throne room… but their combined power was something to be reckoned with. As if they had been made as two halves of a whole, designed and destined to work in tandem. If it didn’t awe him, it would have terrified him.

Absentmindedly, he let a hint of longing down the bond- a longing to fight alongside someone he was made for, a half that matched him. He had felt it transform into something different even before he returned to the _Supremacy_. He remembered how Rey had felt him there, on the planet’s surface. It had been their last Force-linked face-to-face interaction, though neither of them had spoken. He had looked up from the floor of the rebel base, the Falcon’s golden dice clutched in a gloved hand, and saw her waiting by the bay door. His heart had surged, and every muscle had screamed at him to leave the base, to find that blasted ship and board it with her. But something in her eyes had told him _no, you can’t_ , and she had closed the door before he could stand and turn away.

Since then, he had felt her emotions, and he was sure she could feel his, too. Initially, he had sensed her fear and apprehension at sharing a link so deeply personal, something that tied them in a way nothing else could. But somehow she had eased into it. He wasn’t sure if she saw it as a nuisance, or something welcome and useful, like he did. He knew now how lonely they both truly felt; there was no hiding anything between them anymore. 

_You’re not alone._

_Neither are you._

Despite himself, the idea of seeing her again, face-to-face, gave him a sense of anticipation and excitement. After Crait, he had had difficulty associating her with the Resistance. Maybe he was still holding on to that part of him that was convinced she would come back to him. But he knew Rey in earnest now, knew her from the inside out, and he knew she would never sit back and let her friends die. Her life on Jakku was behind her, and she had created her own history with the people she trekked through space with now. It was her past, a past she had molded herself. He knew she wouldn’t let that die.

And it was still hard for him to find a way to eliminate the Resistance without killing her.

His lightsaber hand itched, and he clenched his fists until the leather of his glove resisted and could pull no further. He circled the room, pausing when he neared Snoke’s old chair. He could still spot the bloodstains there, faded but visible, and had to turn away. He remembered striking true, igniting Anakin’s lightsaber from across the room and into Snoke’s side. Again, his hand itched to grab his own saber, and this time he conceded, pulling free the hilt and switching it on.

First the sword itself ignited, filling the space beyond the weapon’s hilt, and then the two crossguards, extending just beyond the saber itself. The light of the sword crackled, an unstable and shaky beam of light, the broken Kyber crystal inside straining under the power of the weapon. Ren examined the lightsaber, turning it this way and that, feeling the hum of the crystal under his palm. Without thinking, he began working on his forms, twirling the saber this way and that, dodging invisible counter-moves and impaling enemies that weren’t there. Unconsciously, he fell into a rhythm that reminded him of the battle that had taken place here, resulting in the death of eight guards. He found himself looking over his shoulder, as if he would find Rey right next to him, fighting off two of her own guards as she held her own. But he was always alone.

Finally, he stood at attention, deactivating the saber. He had no idea how long he had been here, swinging his lightsaber and channeling the Force. His chest rose and fell with heavy breaths, and a thin film of sweat trapped strands of hair that clung to his forehead and neck. He thought training here would bring him closer to the Force and the dark side, bring calm and surety to his mind. Instead, he felt himself missing her even more. He recalled asking her, inviting her, pleading with her, to join him and create a new galaxy alongside him.

_What good is any of this- the Force, the saber, the title of Supreme Leader, if I brave it all alone?_

_Join me._

_…Please._

Without thinking, without realizing, he let the word go, out of his mind, and onto his lips, and once he had spoken it he couldn’t take it back. But it wasn’t just in the air around him now— it traveled down the bond, letter by letter. He felt a quiet resonance accompany the word, but when he reached out to that white light that represented Rey in his mind, he felt shock, felt her grappling with this new information.

And then…

_…Ben?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter seems chock-full of internal monologue: I'm trying to fully flesh out their relationship before we start getting into the nitty-gritty of the plot (which is starting to take shape). Thanks again for reading!


	3. III

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _The path ahead of me, the path I see here, brings only death and destruction. A future that isolates me and destroys me from the inside out. I didn’t realize it then, on Crait, but I know it to be true now._

_…Please._

The word resonated in her mind and almost knocked her out of her chair. She knew immediately who it was. She was breathing hard, trying to wrap her head around what was happening.

She controlled her breathing, whipping her head around to scan the cockpit and the section of corridor beyond it. It was empty, just her and a few porgs occupying the space. She turned back to the window view, looking down at her hands as she forced herself to concentrate, taking one last shaky breath. Tentatively, she reached out across the bond, feeling that black cloud, and sent one word down to him.

_...Ben?_

She hadn’t realized she was holding her breath until her chest started to hurt, and she let the air go between tight lips. She felt nothing back from Ben for what felt like an eternity, but the bond… it was changing. She knew he had heard her. The underlying current of intensity that dictated their Force conversations melded its way into their connection. Even the air in the room seemed to pause, the world coming to a stop around her.

His words echoed around her mind before settling down.

“Why didn’t you let me on?”

The next instant, Ben was sitting next to her, leaning back in the co-pilot chair. Rey physically jumped back in shock, and there was a hint of quiet fear in her that she tried to conceal from him. His feet leaned up against the side of the cockpit’s dashboard, arms crossed, the back of his head leaning against the seat. 

“What?” That same vacuum of air made her words echo before they reach him.

“The _Falcon_. You closed the doors on me. When I saw you there, through the Force.” He waited for her response, and when he got none, he repeated his question. “Why didn’t you let me on the ship?”

Rey was still grappling with his sudden appearance, eyebrows knitted together in indignant confusion. How did the bond snap back to this so quickly? She shook her head as if to clear her mind, searching for an excuse that wouldn't upset him. “There were a lot of reasons.”

“Name one.”

Rey laughed under her breath at the lunacy of the situation, of the conversation they were having. “Do you really want to be on board a ship of twenty-five Resistance fighters who are all trained to kill you and your ilk?"

“I could have fended them off. Barricaded myself in.”

“And avoided your mother?”

Rey could see a muscle in his jaw working, a gloved hand clenching into a fist. She could feel a quiet blip of rage flicker through their bond, too. It was a strange and new sensation, talking to Ben and sensing his emotions at the same time.

“I think you underestimate the power she holds over you.”

This time, there was no controlling the anger that surged through him at that. She could see it painted on his face, and felt it blooming in her mind. His response was short, fast and clipped. “Leia Organa is nothing to me. She holds _no_ power over me.”

Rey turned away from the man next to her. “We both know that’s not true.” 

After a moment, the rage in her mind died away, and Ben’s voice was soft and careful when he spoke again. “I would have come with you. I wouldn’t have made a fuss.”

“Really?” Rey held back a disgruntled scoff. “I think you’re rewriting your story. Reworking the past.”

“I’m not.” Ben’s voice was still soft, even patient, and guilt sliced her to the bone. “I know neither of us can go back to that day on Crait; neither of us can rewrite the past. And I don’t know if you or I would have made the same decision even if we could.” Rey still refused to look at him, but she felt his proximity to her shift as he leaned closer. “But you have to understand that we’re not meant to be apart.”

Rey whipped around, taken aback by his words. “What do you mean?”

“You felt it; I know you did. I can feel it even now.” Rey pressed her lips together as she held his gaze, trying and failing to keep her emotions from giving her away. “After I killed Snoke, with those guards… we are more powerful together than we could ever be apart.”

Rey felt the intensity of his words, of his gaze, his emotions, reverberate in her bones. Goosebumps prickled her skin, and when his hand extended towards her, she forced her eyes away from him and towards the window.

And then the air swirled around her again. She looked back to the pilot’s chair next to her and found it empty, save a porg crawling over the back of the seat. Her breathing came quickly again, and she raked shaky fingers through her hair as she gathered her thoughts.

The bond was still strong between them— that much was beyond dispute. She tentatively reached across the bond, feeling for his emotions, and found that same pleading longing, asking not to be alone. She recoiled from the sensation, from the question.

Her first instinct was to go to Finn, to Leia, to anyone and tell them what happened. Before, when their Force interactions had been spotty and untamed, happening when neither of them expected it, she had felt him easier to control. But now— regardless of whether he had intended it— Ben had summoned himself into her mind. He had ridden along the line of their bond, delivered himself to her, emotions and all. The thought sent shivers down her spine.

She forced herself to backtrack. She knew she had to keep this a secret. As much as she wanted to rid herself of the bond, in that moment, she knew she would regret it. Much to her dismay, their link was the only thing Ben had left— the only semblance of the Light he had. Even now, placing him in the forefront of her mind, she could see his future as clear as she had on Ahch-To, when they had touched hands. A Ben Solo who could shred the moniker of Kylo Ren and rid himself of the Dark Side, or at least find balance. 

She didn’t want to admit it to herself, but the link was all she had left, too.

Rey hadn’t realized how liberating it would feel to be around another Force user. When she arrived on Ahch-To, interacting and training with Luke had let the Force inside her blossom and flourish. She felt whole, like a piece of her had finally been unlocked. But Ben had been right; there had been no feeling like fighting alongside him on the _Supremacy_. Since she had left him, unconscious and lying on the floor of Snoke’s throne room, there had been something missing. The Force was a part of her now, a part that made up the whole of Rey, and she couldn’t live without that. No one else on board the _Falcon_  understood that, except maybe Leia, and then only an inkling. No one else in her life but Ben knew what it was like to be one with the Force.

She settled back into the pilot’s chair, her mind made up. She would keep this a secret, for now; the bond she shared with Ben had never endangered her or anyone around her, and until it did, she could keep it to herself. 

* * *

The next time he came to her, mere hours later, she was in her shared quarters.

She had managed to fit a spare bedroll, emblazoned with the symbol of the Rebellion, between two flat exhaust pipes. Rose had grimaced at the sight of her setup, complaining about how uncomfortable it looked. Rey had only smiled, reminding Rose of the years she had spent taking shelter in an overturned AT-AT on Jakku.

Connix was asleep on her own bedroll, on the floor across the small cargo hold, and Rose was nowhere to be seen. Rey crept in quietly, exhausted after pilot duty, and nudged herself into her little crawlspace.

“Why are you so afraid of this?”

Rey shuddered at the sound of his voice, the shock of the sudden connection overwhelming her. It was easier for her to regain her thoughts this time. “I’m not.” She hoped he couldn’t spot her lie from across the bond.

“You are. You keep shying away.” Ben leaned against a storage closet against the opposite wall. She could feel his hurt seeping across their link, and he sounded wounded when he spoke.

Her eyes shifted to Connix’s sleeping form on the other side of the room. “Can we not do this now?” 

“When you were with Luke, on that island, you told me I wasn’t alone. That neither of us were alone. I’m not getting that sentiment from you now.” His voice turned to steel, eyes narrowing. She felt a hint of displeasure leak into her mind.

“I meant it, Ben.” Rey met his gaze; it was her turn to show him her hurt. “We’re all each other has now. You wanted to let the past die— the Sith and Jedi masters of old. They’re dead now. And we’re all they left behind.” 

Ben finally broke eye contact, pacing, walking towards her just to turn around and retrace his steps.

Rey kept talking, not waiting for him to settle. “But you’ll have to excuse me if I don’t adjust to this immediately. This… _new_ bond.” She paused, but when she got no response, she kept going, watching him closely. “What we can do now, the Force bringing us together in all these different ways… it doesn’t scare you? Just a little bit?”

“It strengthens me. It reassures me.” Ben stopped pacing to face her again, holding her gaze. “It reminds me that we’re two halves of the same whole. That we’re complete when we’re together.”

Rey stood from her crawlspace in one fluid movement, standing her ground on her side of the room. “I feel it too, Ben. But just because we’re apart now doesn’t mean that we’re powerless. We aren’t halves of a whole. We’re complete beings on our own, even apart.”

In an overwhelming moment of weakness she felt across the bond, Ben bowed his head, examining his naked hands as he breathed shaky breaths. “Are we?” His voice was just a murmur. Even from across the room, she could see his fingers trembling. “I’m so lost, Rey. I’ve always felt this conflict, but… it’s so much stronger now.”

Without thinking, she crossed the room and grabbed his hands, stilling them. A streak of light, like a bolt of lighting, hurtled across their link, and Rey felt the impact of it take her breath away. It cleared both their minds, wiping away their emotions, but just for an instant. When Rey looked up from their hands, clasped in one another, to examine his eyes, she knew he had felt it, too. Understanding floated across the bond.

“This…” Ben squeezed her hands. “This is all I can count on. The only part of my life that doesn’t waver.”

“If you need to, trust in this.” Rey’s voice was just a whisper.

“I don’t know what to do. The path ahead of me, the path I see on the _Supremacy_ , brings only death and destruction. A future that isolates me and destroys me from the inside out. I didn’t realize it then, on Crait, but I know it to be true now.” Ben took another shaky breath. “But if I want to stay alive, if I want to survive the First Order, I have to take it.”

Rey tried to shove down her incertitude, keeping her grasp on his hands firm, as if letting go would make him disappear. “I want you to stay alive.” The admission was not only to him, but to herself. “But I don’t want it to come at a cost.”

When Ben met her gaze, his eyes were steel again, but in a way that didn’t summon feelings of aggression in her. It was more surety than anger. “We’ve obtained an address number I recognize as the _Falcon_ ’s. If you bring comms online, the First Order will track your location, and once they know where you are, they’ll hunt you down and kill you all.” 

Rey’s head swam with this new revelation, and her brow furrowed as she tried to make sense of it. “We’ll need to bring comms online if we want to land on a planet.”

“Then you need to put it off as long as possible. When you land, make sure it’s somewhere safe, somewhere you can defend yourself.” Ben paused. “No matter what, _you need to stay alive_.”

Rey nodded, grappling with this information. “Okay.”

They could both feel the bond that brought them together shimmer, as if Ben would wink out at any moment. Their faces were inches apart, and Rey had to resist reaching up and touching his face, tracing her fingers across the scar she had given him. She had never felt this closeness, this physical and emotional proximity, to anyone else before. As careful as she was to deny it, she did feel a different wholeness with Ben. It was separate from the Force, separate from even herself. She opened her mouth to speak.

And when she blinked, he was gone.

Rey breathed out, dropping her hands. All at once, she remembered where she was, and shot a quick glance over at Connix, who was thankfully still asleep on the other side of the room. She gave herself a moment to catch her breath before returning to her bedroll, unsure of what else to do. Her head swam, memories of their conversation flashing through her head as she laid down. Ben’s confession of loneliness, of deepened conflict. His disclosure of the First Order’s intentions. She barely let herself wonder if she could trust Ben. The last moments with him, she didn’t know how to decipher, to understand. But she knew one thing for certain.

_I need to keep those comms offline._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I surprised myself and got this chapter out in less than a day, so I figured I might as well publish it lol. Sorry if there's any errors, I edited it super quickly and might have glazed over some things. Thanks again for reading and happy new year to you all!!


	4. IV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _I’m not trying to foster the darkness within him. I want him to find balance, to find peace. Isn’t that what all Jedi want?_

“General… might I have a word?”

Rey stood meekly in the doorway of the main hold, where Commander Dameron, General Leia, and Finn spoke in hushed tones and fervent gestures, forming a tight circle in the corner. A few Resistance fighters were scattered about the room: two or three sleeping in bedrolls on the floor, a pair chatting quietly in the corner, and one sprawled across the sofa next to the Dejarik table. Everyone awake in the room raised their heads to examine her, a few even offering tight smiles in greeting. Finn raised a hand and waved her over.

She stepped gingerly around a few sleeping forms, making her way towards the small group. “I didn’t want to disturb you all. I just wanted a quick word.” 

“No worries.” Finn flashed her a big grin. “We were just…” He glanced around at the rest of his group for an answer.

“Discussing battle plans.” Poe finished for him, at the same time Finn cut back in with “strategizing”.

Rey flashed a polite smile. “Well, again, I just wanted to bring… something to your attention. No need to take up everyone’s time.”

“It’s no problem.” Leia gave her a smile that reached her eyes. “What is it?”

Rey took a deep breath, looking at each of them in turn, not sure where to begin. “…Are you sure Bespin is a good place to catch our breath?”

Leia stood there for a beat, absorbing Rey’s words. “As good a place as I know. I’ve got connections down there that can help us find more recruits, more weapons before we’re on our way to a new base.”

“Yes, but…” Rey scrambled for a way to talk to the group without revealing her connection with Ben. “Are you sure it’s defensible?”

“Who cares?” Poe scoffed. “It doesn’t need to be. The First Order will spend at least a few weeks gathering its forces and collecting surveillance, and that’s all the time we need.”

Rey squirmed, unsure of how to proceed. “…Do you know if we can land on Bespin without taking the ship’s comms online?” 

Poe shook his head in confusion at the sudden change in topic, making brief eye contact with Leia, who was just as confused. “Well… no, it’s impossible, as far as I know. The receiving station will need our address to place us in a holding bay, and—“

“Could we land without connecting with the receiving station? Even at another planet?”

Leia shook her head, laughing. “Alright, Rey, what is going on? Where is this coming from?”

“General Leia… I’m worried that if we expose ourselves by taking our communications back online, that… spies could tap into private comms networks like the ones at receiving stations, and reveal our location to the First Order.”

“It’s much more likely they would see the  _Millennium Falcon_ flying through the air and report on that than take the effort of hacking into a comms channel.” Finn chimed in. “It’s more about observation than surveillance for them.”

“And Bespin’s a busy planet, right?” Rey insisted. “There’s no way Imperial forces wouldn’t at least _spot_ the _Falcon_.” 

“Well, Bespin is an Outer Rim planet. And it’s always been unaffiliated, not taking sides. Bad for business.” Leia defended herself. “If I thought we’d be blown to bits by the First Order upon entry, I wouldn’t have suggested it.”

“There’s threat of danger anywhere we go; at least on Bespin, we have friends we can turn to when the fighting begins.” Poe concurred with Leia.

Rey could tell she was losing this argument, and had to reach for the trump card. She turned to Leia. “Can we talk… elsewhere?” 

Poe’s brows knitted together, immediately wary. “Rey… do you know something you’re not telling us?”

Rey’s heart sank into her stomach; it was getting harder and harder for her to dance around the subject of her bond with Ben. “It’s highly sensitive information I’d rather not share with everyone.” She tapped her head, a nervous smile on her lips. “Need-to-know.” 

Her ploy didn’t work with him; Poe stepped back, rejected. “Fine. General.” He didn’t bother to hide his sour mood as he nodded to Leia and walked out of the hold. Finn trailed behind, catching Poe’s hand and shooting an apologetic look at Rey.

Leia turned to her. “Alright, you’ve upset my commander; you’ve got to tell me the truth now. What is going on, Rey? Why are you so afraid of landing at Bespin? Of putting our comms online?” 

Rey hesitated, unsure of how to continue. “I just really, really need you to trust me with this next part.”

Leia took a deep breath, wiping a hand over her face in exasperation. She met Rey’s steely gaze with her own wary one. “Okay.”

“The First Order has obtained the comms address of the Falcon. They’re going to use it to track our location as soon as we come out of hyperspace and bring comms back online.”

Rey could tell just from the look she got from Leia that the general’s head was swimming. “But that’s impossible.” 

“They have the technology. They must have done it before, because they know now that it will work. They’re betting on it.” Rey swallowed. “As soon as we put comms back on, we’re dead within hours. I’m sure they’ve got Star Destroyers stationed all over the galaxy, just waiting for the command.”

Leia caught her breath as she grappled with this, leaning against a storage locker for support. Her eyes flickered up to study Rey’s face. “How do you know all this?”

Rey’s stomach clenched up, anxiety seeping into her bones. “Well… I…”

“If you have someone on the inside, funneling information to the Resistance from the First Order, we need to know about it.”

“No. It was, um…” Rey stammered before finally coming to her conclusion. “A force vision. I had a force vision about it.”

“About what?”

Rey had to scramble providing details to fill in the lie. “There were… officers, from the First Order, discussing our comms address on board their ship. I heard Ben— Kylo Ren asking for information about the number. He said once the number was online, they could track it. I knew it to be true; it wasn’t something from the future, it was from the past.”

Leia gave her a long, unrelenting look that cut her to the bone. Her eyes were old, and wise, but in that moment they burned with the severity of a blaster bolt. Rey stood her ground, trying her best not to squirm.

“If you’re lying,” Leia said in a coarse whisper, “I’ll know. And when we’re blown to bits, it’ll be on _your_ conscience.”

Rey shook her head. “I promise you, Leia. I’m not lying.” In a fit of sentiment, she grabbed the general’s hands, pleading with her. “I need you to believe me. I wouldn’t lie about this.”

Leia’s face stilled, wiped of any emotion. She slid her hands out of Rey’s grasp. For a moment, Rey was sure she’d somehow been found out: that Leia would call her out on her lie, and reveal her bond with Ben.

But the moment passed, and Leia nodded, breaking eye contact. “Fine. Okay. I believe you.”

Rey breathed a sigh of relief, but it was short-lived. “You know you can’t tell Poe I know this, right? Or any other high ranking command?”

Leia’s brow furrowed again. “Well, I mean, if it was just a force vision…”

“I just— I don’t want people knowing I had one.” Rey attempted a sheepish grin.

Leia laughed, bowing her head for a moment. “Alright, fine. I’ll have to talk to high command about finding a new planet to regroup on, but it shouldn’t be too hard; we have backlogs of old Rebel bases that date back to the beginning of the Civil War.”

“Couldn’t we return to D’Qar, to the Ileenium system?” Rey queried, head tilting.

Leia shook her head. “One of the First Order’s dreadnoughts took out the base during evacuation. But we can revisit the station, and other Ileenium planets. Don’t worry,” Leia reached up to pat Rey’s arm, “We’ve all got it under control. All you need to worry about is steering the ship.”

Rey smiled down at her, feeling genuinely at ease for the first time since her conversation with Ben. “Thank you. For trusting me.”

“I’ll go tell Chewie to replot our course.” Leia gave her one last quick smile, then went to leave through the hold’s main corridor. 

Rey was left alone then, in the main hold. The pair that had been chatting in the corner shot her a quick glance, and looked away as soon as they made eye contact with her. She resigned herself to return to her main quarters, and try and catch some sleep before another round of pilot duty tomorrow. 

As she walked back down the now-empty main corridor circling the _Falcon_ , she felt a sense of reassurance, of newfound safety, that she let soar down the bond. It was met with steely apathy; Ben must have been busy dealing with First Order business. She shivered at the thought of him carrying out the desires of the enemy, and she had to shake her head to clear her head and avoid dwelling on it. She had considered him an adversary for so long, and even after he divulged top-secret First Order intelligence, she wasn’t sure whose side he was on. If he could even pick a side.

She returned to her shared quarters to find the small room full. Connix still laid where Rey had left her, but Rose had laid down too, and was snoring softly in the opposite corner. She made her way delicately to her bedroll laying along the exhaust pipes, settled in, and fell asleep what felt like seconds later.

* * *

_She’s on Ahch-To again, training with Luke. She allows herself to work within the forms she practices, feeling a genuine sense of comfort and stability, of safety and strength. She swings Anakin’s lightsaber this way and that, deflecting Luke’s blows without sawing the metal of his staff in two. She finds herself executing the same forms she used to kill the Praetorian guards alongside Ben, and the thought fuels her, gives her a new sense of energy when she thinks she has nothing left._

_Without warning, Luke propels an outstretched hand in front of him, his fingers trembling as he yells, “_ Stop! _”, and Rey does. He's stilled her with the Force, but it doesn't last long, he lets her go, and she drops the extinguished lightsaber._

_“What is it?” Rey’s breathing was heavy, exhausted from swinging the saber, but Luke barely moves._

_“I know what you’re doing. With him.”_

_Rey’s heart stops in her chest. Nothing like this has ever happened._

_“What are you talking about?” Her voice is just a whisper, and more a flat statement than a question._

_“Your link. With Ben.” Luke all but spits the words at her feet, his disgust immeasurable. “I’ve felt it. Your_ actions _are sending waves down the Force.”_

_Rey blinks, stunned. “I’m not doing anything.”_

_“That’s what you think. But the bond you two share… it won’t be harmless forever.” Luke turns around, stalking through the billowing grass and away from her. “I should have severed it the moment I saw you two together!”_

_“No, stop!” Rey runs to catch up with her former master, halting in front of him to keep him from going any further. She finds her confidence, fists clenched in resolve, before continuing. “You told me the Jedi were a force for peace and justice in the galaxy. Despite their vanity, their intentions were good. Above all, their religion valued balance, and the banishment of evil and Dark.” Rey keeps her eyes on Luke, tries to see beyond his disgust and shame. “That’s what I want for Ben, what I’m trying to accomplish by staying connected with him. I’m not trying to foster the darkness within him. I want him to find balance, to find peace. Isn’t that what all Jedi want?”_

_Luke isn’t giving up that easily. “The Jedi are gone because they didn’t know when to stop. When to give up on a lost cause. I worked for years to show Ben the light, to bring him balance, but it was a losing battle. When I visited him, that night he destroyed the training school, I saw that his darkness... it was immeasurable, Rey. I couldn’t defeat it on my own.” He tears his gaze from hers, looking out across the waves surrounding the island. A thousand images flash through her head in an instant: the destroyed Jedi school, the bodies of dead apprentices, unending and terrible war. An image of Han’s lifeless body, struck through with a flame of red light, lingers longer than most. “You need to accept it. Ben Solo is_ gone _.”_

_Her head swims, emotions peaking. “_ No _. I won’t give up.” Her voice, through gritted teeth, holds a bite of malice she doesn't try to conceal, and tears of fierce anger pool in her eyes. “I’ve seen his future. I know Ben Solo can be shown the balance, that he can give up his power to embrace it.” She swallows, mustering her resolve. “We were made to bring harmony to the Force.”_

_Luke’s stare is pure disbelief. “Really?” He looked behind her, inclining his head as his brows rose in scornful incredulity. “Do you think he believes that, too?”_

_Rey’s eyes narrow, struggling to discern his meaning, when she follows his gaze behind her, and sees Ben standing on a hill a short distance away. The wind blows his mop of hair across his face, and he’s dressed in regular First Order garb, cape billowing in the wind. He doesn’t seem to see her, instead staring down Luke. When she turns back to her former master, she sees the unspoken look, the rage and wrath passing between them, so intense it’s almost tangible. Ben’s dominant hand flexes, and she feels him aching to reach for the lightsaber, to run across the grass and cut down a man who’s already dead._

_“Ben!” She turns around fully now, her back facing Luke. Her steps towards him are slow at first, but the closer she gets, the faster she walks, then runs. “Ben! Don’t give in to this! Don’t give in!” He can’t hear her, can’t see her, is only focused on Luke’s force across the field. His lip curls in a snarl, and his hand reaches for his weapon._

_She feels the air pause around her, just for a millisecond, and then move twice as fast, the wind whipping away loose strands of her hair. She stops, breaks her gaze from Ben to look behind her, and Luke is gone, no trace of him left anywhere in their proximity. When she turns back around, Ben is just feet from her, close enough for her to reach out and touch. His eyes are trained on her, an intensity reverberating through their gaze, through their bond, that she cannot describe._

_He reaches out to her, their fingertips grazing, Their eyes lock, and the next moment, Ben’s close. Everything is white, as if she were being blinded, and then black._

* * *

She sat up in an instant, gasping, her arms wrapped around herself. She had to concentrate to keep those tears of anger, of intensity, from falling down her cheeks. She clenched and unclenched her fists, driving the crescents of her fingernails into her palms to bring her back to the present. She had dreams of Ahch-To before, of training with Luke, but never one where he spoke to her directly. And never one where Ben appeared.

Instinctively, she reached down the bond, searching for Ben. _Was that you? Were you really there with me?_

At first, she was met with pure anger, an indefinable resentment she couldn't make sense of or sort through. But after a moment it cleared, and she felt Ben on the other side of the link. 

_Yes._

Rey took in a breath, the bond reigniting and transforming in her mind again. Ben hadn’t appeared to her physically, like he had before, but this was more than just undefinable emotions. Why did it change so often, always warping and altering itself to connect them?

_How?_

There was a notable pause from Ben; the bond flickered for a moment, as if they might lose the connection. _I felt rage from you. Rage, and sadness, and fear. It felt like it was going to burn up the bond, turn it to ash. So I looked inside those emotions, and there was a door to that vision._

_It was a dream,_ Rey sent back silently.

_All I could see was Luke._ Ben spoke more with emotion than exposition, and the bond renewed itself. _He was taunting you, Rey. Trying to isolate you._ She felt anger brewing in him again.

_He forced these… images into my head. Of the dead and dying. And he tied it all back to you._ Rey felt tears pooling in her eyes again, but from melancholy and despair rather than anger.

_Luke fears the bond, Rey. He fears this connection. He’s always feared what he couldn’t control._ In an instant, Ben transformed his anger into resoluteness. _Don’t let him destroy it._

Rey blinked. _Luke is_ dead _, Ben._

She felt his pause linger in the bond, felt the silence between them reverberate in their minds. Then he was gone.

And one sentence still rang in her head, stuck there no matter how hard she tried to forget.

_The bond you two share… it won’t be harmless forever._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter took a bit longer-- I've definitely been struggling to find a balance (lol) between plot progression and character development, hence adding on some extra chapters. I'm finding that the more I write the story, the easier it is for me to write from Rey's POV, and the harder it is to write from Ben's, especially when most of the action is happening on the Falcon. Hopefully, I'll be able to add more Ben POV next chapter and get the story going a little faster. Anyways, I hope you all enjoyed and thanks again for reading!!!


	5. V

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _He still felt that fire, that tearing pain that signified the divide between light and dark in him. He was married to both, in different ways. Delineating too close to one made him yearn for the other._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PS before the chap. starts: if you're looking for some Reylo-esque music recs, 95% of the songs on London Grammar's Truth Is A Beautiful Thing album are VERY reylo. I wrote most of this chapter listening to either Trials (demo) or Hell to the Liars, if you need some good stock background music. (Also makes excellent crying music in general!!) Ok enjoy!!!!  
> PPS: This chapter starts ~1-2 days after the events of the last chapter, just keep that in mind.

“Where are you right now?”

He could see Rey tense across his quarters in the repaired _Supremacy_. She was put off, again, by their connection, by the appearance of him in her own space. She repositioned herself in her chair, taking great care not to look at him. “ _Falcon_ cockpit. You’re in the co-pilot’s seat."

Kylo Ren’s voice dropped an octave. “You know that’s not what I meant.”

Rey leaned forward, busying herself with the controls on the _Falcon_ ’s dashboard. “I’m not going to give you sensitive information like that.”

“Why? Because I’m the enemy?”

She paused, just enough to hurt him. “You’re the Supreme Leader of the First Order.”

“Who gave you life-saving instructions.” Ren kept his eyes trained on her. “If I hadn’t told you what I did, it would be very likely that pieces of the  _Millennium Falcon_ would now be strewn across some Outer Rim star system.”

“How poetic of you.” He could tell Rey was dancing around the topic, avoiding conversation with him.

Out of nowhere, his patience ran out. He was sick of being treated like a petulant child by the only person who had the gall to understand him, to continue this connection. He didn’t hold back when he spoke. “I’ve been nothing but tolerant with you, nothing but patient, but you keep shutting me out like this, always keeping me at an arm’s reach unless I’m close to breaking. What is it? _Why_ do you keep doing this?”

Her pause, her short glance away, was long enough for him to discern the truth. “You believed him. You believed Luke.” He breathed.

“That’s not true.” Rey's voice was quiet, but she still refused his gaze.

“It is. You think this bond— the link we share, bestowed upon us by the Force— has the power to bring death and destruction. And it does.” Rey didn’t bother to hide her shock at that, but he kept going. “But it also has the power to heal, to bring peace and balance to a galaxy that has only ever known war and strife.” His voice rising, he let his emotions, the truth of his words pour down the bond, resonate with her.

Rey finished for him. “Luke only saw the death and destruction. It scared him, the power of it. That’s why he wanted me to give up, to let go.” He could feel the resolve growing in her. She looked at him, through him, and he only saw assurance in her eyes. “But I won’t.”

Suddenly, he felt a hint of remorse, ashamed of pushing her to this point.

“Why did you kill your father?”

The question was a blow to his gut, coming out of nowhere, and he had to concentrate to keep his emotions in check. She must have felt the flare of it, though, because she tried to explain it away. “I never got a straight answer from you the first time I asked.”

It took him a moment, but eventually, he opened his mouth, and tried to explain the events of the past. “It was the conflict, inside me.” The sadness, the regret, overtook him almost immediately, but he kept going. “I thought if I… if I killed him, it would bring me closer to the dark side. It would make me stronger, banish that constant war that was tearing me apart. It was all I ever wanted, during that time with Snoke, was to be free of that conflict, and commit to the dark.” His voice was just a whisper, strained, but Rey was hanging onto every word. “And that was always Snoke’s way. When he sensed trepidation in me, he commanded the death of the past, of those I used to love and care about.” He swallowed. “He thought if I killed the past, it wouldn’t haunt me. But he was wrong. It’s why I killed him— to be free of him. He couldn’t teach me anything more if he was always wrong.”

Her hand landed on his, and he felt that same crackle of electricity as the first time they had touched. When he looked into her eyes, they were sincere, and comforting. Her eyes felt like home. He felt those same emotions trickle down the bond, into his own mind.

“The past isn’t dead, Ben.” Her voice sent shivers down his spine. “You don’t have to kill it. You can return to it— I know you doubt this, but it’s the truth. The light— the balance— it’s your destiny, your future. It’s waiting for you.”

Ren shook his head. “I wish I could believe you.” Conflict tore at his mind, so palpable it turned his stomach.

“You can. What’s holding you back?”

A thousand different thoughts, different excuses, ran through his mind, but when he opened his mouth, he couldn’t find the strength to use any of them. They weren’t good enough, and Rey would see right through them.

She seemed to sense his indecision, because she switched topics, returning to his original question. “The _Falcon_ is still in hyperspace, but we’re planning to land tomorrow. And we can’t do that without comms. So…  I just wanted you to be ready.”

He understood her meaning. “Thank you.” Ren’s voice was strangled, and he had to concentrate to keep his feelings from flooding the bond. “Will you be ready?”

He felt a whisper, and when he looked up, he was alone again, her form gone from his mind. The link persisted in him, though, and her emotions told him she was busy with something else. Most likely, someone had walked into the cockpit of the _Falcon_ , and she had been forced to sever the bond. Still, their conversation lingered through the connection they shared, and he sat there, isolated in his quarters, for a long time, mulling on what they had said.

He still felt that fire, that tearing pain that signified the divide between light and dark in him. He was married to both, in different ways. Delineating too close to one made him yearn for the other. 

The conflict was all there was. And he would very well die before attaining the light or surrendering to the dark.

* * *

“Supreme Leader… the comms address is online.”

Kylo Ren turned from his place by the landing bay’s viewport. “And?”

“They’re running it through the tracking system as we speak. Hux has requested the honor of your presence on the bridge to oversee preparations.”

_Of_ course _he has._ “I’ll be there shortly.”

The officer excused himself with a bow and a curt “sir”, leaving Ren alone. 

He took a deep breath, his eyes down. Carefully, he reached towards that white light in his head, and tapped into the bond.

She appeared next to him, her shoulder to his shoulder, as if she had been waiting for his arrival inside her mind. They were both getting better at summoning one another, instead of waiting for the Force to bring them together. She turned her head to meet his eyes, and a knowing glance passed between them before Ren broke the gaze and looked back out to the landing bay. The ghost of their conversation from the night before hovered between them.

“The First Order will have your location in a matter of moments.” His voice was quiet, steady. “I hope you're prepared.”

“We will be.” Rey’s voice was cool and unaffected, and it sent chills down his spine. Absently, he was reminded of their first battle on Starkiller Base, where she had all but bested him, a snarl on her face as she circled him and planned her next strike.

She turned to him, and all of that ferocity was gone from her eyes. “What will you do?”

Ren's lips quivered, and he pursed them. “I don’t know.” He let his head drop. _I’ve spent so much time contemplating her safety that I’ve had little time to secure my own._  Rey went to reach for him, but he stepped back, walking away from her.

“Ben.” His old name in her voice made him stop in his tracks. “You told me I need to stay alive. And I’ll try my best.” She closed the distance between them in a few short steps, and grabbed his hand. Again, that same shock of electricity ricocheted down the bond. “But you need to stay alive, too.”

He turned to face her fully, and she clasped his other hand in hers. “What if I can’t do that? What if there’s no escaping the First Order— no escaping this prison I’ve created for myself?” He didn’t hold back the flood of his strife and despair that went through the bond.

He could see tears pooling in her eyes, and felt her squeeze his hands. “I found the Force inside me just as I found you, Ben. We’ve grown together. And I need you with me to wield this power— to show them light and dark.” She swallowed. “I don’t know how else to help rid you of Snoke, of the First Order. But don’t leave me alone in this galaxy.”

Their faces were inches apart, their bodies even closer. Ren would have been able to feel her breath on him, if she had truly been there. Her eyes searched his, searched for an affirmation that he would make it out of this alive, an affirmation he couldn’t give her. He felt a heavy melancholy floating to him through the bond, felt it so strongly it became his own. 

“You’re the _only_ one who understands me. Who understands _this_.” He squeezed her hands. His voice was just a whisper, but he knew she heard it loud and clear. He leaned closer to her.

“I know.” She mouthed the words. He could feel her heart beating.

A beat of silence, of nothingness, bounced between them. Warmth and quiet compassion flooded the bond. Rey stood up on her toes, heels hovering above the ground, and he closed the distance, head bending down. His hands fell from her grasp, one settling on her cheek, the other wrapping around her waist, holding her close to him. Her fingers, long and slender, reached up to trace the scar bisecting his face, and every nerve in his body seemed attuned to the pads of her fingers grazing his skin. She conceded to his touch, pressing her body to his, hands moving to lay against his chest. 

He leaned down, closer, his mouth hovering a beat away from hers. In the end, she came to him, closing the distance to press her lips to his, leaning on him for support. The link between them crackled with desire, each of them shifting with the bond. Her lips were soft underneath his, her touch apprehensive but welcoming after being isolated, alone for so long. Her arms wrapped around him, surrounding him with her touch. He felt fire in his stomach, a quiet flame whose warmth ran from his heart down every nerve in his body. He felt illuminated and alive. 

He tore his lips from hers, still holding her in his grasp, still inches away. Strands of hair veiled her in his gaze, barely touching her forehead. Reality drifted back to him like a cold, persistent wind. “I need to… coordinate pursuit from the bridge.” His voice was small, and quiet, jarring after the intimacy of their closeness.

Rey’s eyes were pools of sorrow, of conflicted despair, but she nodded in mute understanding. “Okay.”

He removed himself from her carefully, and once they’d separated, he walked back towards the door. “I’ll see you…” _When? Soon? Never?_ He couldn’t finish the sentence, and he didn’t try. Instead, he gave her one last glance over his shoulder, and left before he could see the tear fall onto her cheek, before he could see her fade into nothingness. 

He schooled his emotions into line, and prepared for his visit to the bridge, to Hux, as the doors slip open. The room was buzzing with activity, with a handful of officers crowded around each computer. Hux sidled up next to him as Ren walked towards the main viewport, filling him in. “We’ve got three dozen officers tracking the number. It must have a scrambling device attached, which is why it’s taking more time than anticipated. We’re getting signals from a dozen different points across the galaxy— verifying them all will take time.”

Ren knew if he had the list in front of him— if he commanded Hux read them out to him— the Force would show him where the _Falcon_ was. He opened his mouth, but thought better of it. He wouldn’t make the mistake of letting the Snoke in him speak again. _The more time I can buy Rey, the better._  His heart thudded, and ached. “You know how much longer it will be?”

“Minutes, Supreme Leader.” Hux’s lip curled into a sneer. “And by the end of the day, the Resistance will be snuffed out, once and for all.”

An officer jumped back from one of the bridge computers before Ren could react to that. “I’ve got it, sir. Verified coordinates of the address’s location.”

Ren stepped forward before Hux could speak. “Where are they?”

“The coordinates point to Hoth, sir. An Outer Rim planet that once housed a Rebel base.”

“A base they’re using as shelter.” Hux didn’t need the Force to make that connection. “Are there any super star destroyers closer to the planet than we are?”

“Negative, General.” The young officer’s voice quivered. Ren doubted he’d ever done anything as daunting as giving sensitive information like this to high command.

Hux smiled, the corners of his lips pulling up slowly in a way that made Ren’s stomach twist. “The privilege is yours, Supreme Leader.”

Ren’s fingers retracted into the leather covering his palms, and he had to clench his jaw to keep from yelling back at Hux, at igniting his lightsaber and mowing down every officer in sight. He got close, but Rey, and the short interaction they had had, was still at the forefront of his mind. _You need to stay alive, too._  He narrowed his eyes, taking deep breaths to gather himself, careful not to betray his true feelings. The eyes of a dozen commanders and generals were trained on him, waiting for his words.

“Make the jump to light speed.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IT'S HAPPENING  
> So sorry this chapter took longer than anticipated!! There are lots of moving parts I'm still trying to iron out, and I had a total crisis about the direction of the story for a second, but I'm back on track and hopefully the next few chapters will be better than ever. Things are _really_ gonna start moving in the next part, so expect the next chapter, double the normal length, in about a week. Thanks again for reading!!!


	6. VI

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _No one had any idea how long it would be before the First Order was at their doorstep, and the bond had been largely ignored by her since she had disconnected with Ben last. She rationalized that it would make things easier, make it easier for her to fire on the First Order. The silence on the other end made her conclude that he was thinking in the same vein. The idea of turning back to her previous thoughts— to thinking about him—made her stomach twist._

Rey reached up to wipe the moisture from her cheek. She felt the _Falcon_ ’s engines hum as landing procedures began, and remembered her place. She scrubbed at her eyes then, sighing, trying to regain focus. But when she closed her eyes, rubbing until she felt white spots dotting her vision, all she could see was Ben.

Her hands gripped the edges of the sink. She felt broken inside, shaken to her core. When she had met Kylo Ren, and seen him kill Han Solo, she had vowed to retaliate, to seek justice. He had been a terrible, evil man to her, back then. But with the bond they shared, and all she knew now… things had changed. He had become Ben to her. She hadn’t even known she cared about him, especially in that way, until he had opened up to her. Until he had… touched her.

Rey shook her head, eyes still slammed shut, as if the physical action would help clear her head. The facts were facts— she cared about him, for better or worse. She didn’t have time to dwell on this now— the Resistance would soon face the wrath of the First Order, in a battle that was nearly impossible to win. She had to concentrate on that. 

She sighed, opening her eyes and peering at her reflection in the mirror. _This will have to do_. Rey left the refresher in a hurry, heading back towards the main hold.

“Echo Base has been largely untouched since its attack by Imperial troops, three decades ago. It was nearly destroyed then, certainly rendered unusable, but we’re using it for defense, not coordinated attack. Though both would be nice.” Leia murmured the last part under her breath, but for the most part she spoke quickly. Time was a luxury now. 

Comms on the _Falcon_  had been brought back online in order to land safely on Hoth, and Rey had told Leia personally that the First Order was after them now. She had initially argued for a blind landing, days ago, keeping comms offline until they were settled in the old Rebel base. Chewie, however, had insisted they send out a landing call, not wanting to lose the last remnant of the Resistance to an easily avoidable collision with something or someone on the planet. The precaution had been unnecessary, though; the twenty-five souls about to disembark on Hoth would be the only sentient life there. Now, they stood in the same cargo hold Leia had first suggested new bases in, just days ago, as Chewie coordinated landing procedures in the cockpit. Rey had volunteered to help the Wookiee land the ship, but Leia didn’t let her out of her sight, in case she had another “force vision” that might give them an advantage in battle.

“Commanders Dameron and D’Acy have coordinated about a dozen different attack plans, depending on how well the base has held up, but it’s going to come down to outsmarting them. For now, we’re outgunned and outnumbered. We received about a dozen different responses to our initial distress call on Crait once we put comms back online, so if we can stall for time, we’ll receive help soon enough.”

Rey heard the hiss of the _Falcon_ ’s landing gear engaging, and seconds later the ship lurched as it connected with the ground. Leia looked around the room, at the two dozen faces that were the last hope against the First Order. “Alright, that’s our cue.” Fighters filed out of the cargo hold and down the hall, following her lead. 

Rey stayed where she was, watching the Resistance leave the hold and disembark onto the base, smiling absently at a few of them as they passed. She assumed she would be coordinating attacks from the _Falcon_  with Chewbacca, and a supplementary gunner, if there wasn’t a spare X-wing inside Echo Base. When she thought the room was empty, she turned to leave, but spotted someone out of the corner of her eye. _Poe_. He was watching her, from the opposite side of the room. His eyes narrowed. It made the hair on her arms stand on end.

Rey attempted a light smile. “I thought you would be out on the base by now.”

Poe returned the smile, but it was gone the next second, and didn’t reach his eyes. “Rey, you’re keeping something from Leia. From me, from all of us. I know it.”

Her stomach dropped. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Poe barked out a mirthless laugh. “I don’t know how you got this information about the comms address, but I know you’re holding back. I see right through this, and I know Leia does too, but she trusts you too much to say so. Trusts in the false hope you provide.” He paused just feet from her, his eyes narrowed. “Just… tell me the truth.”

Rey looked down at her hands, sweating under Poe’s gaze. “It’s not false hope. And if I told you, you wouldn’t like it.” She swallowed, meeting his eyes. “But I’m just trying to keep everyone alive. Just like you are.”

Rey could see a muscle working in Poe’s jaw. He seemed to remember himself, suddenly. “Right. Well, then.” He edged around her and made his way down the hall, towards the bay doors. Rey breathed out, feeling as though she’d just been interrogated. 

Chewie had been polite enough to park the _Falcon_  inside the base to save the crew from the snowy trek inside. “We’ll be seeing enough snow over the next cycle, so get used to it.” Leia’s voice rang off the walls and to her ears. Rey briefly looked behind her, towards the open hangar door they had come through, to see three muscled Resistance fighters pulling hard on a lever she assumed would shut and secure it. The door was budging, but not closing. Beyond it, an unforgiving landscape of snowy tundra waited for them. Rey set her shoulders and turned back around, heading in the direction of the base proper.

The white halls were dilapidated, dead wires hanging from the ceiling here and there. Once or twice, she had to edge herself around fallen tubing, or collapsed walls. The corridors seemed to go on forever, but the longer she walked, the more secure she felt; they were so deep into the mountainous glacier, so far removed from the impending heat of battle. Air gunners would hardly penetrate a base this isolated from the outside, and if ground fighters could crack the base open, the narrow, winding halls would be an obstacle that would give the Resistance time to escape. _Hopefully._

Eventually, she came across a narrow, low-ceilinged room, filled with outdated monitors and computers. Most of the displays were either destroyed or devoid of power, and those that still functioned were in low-power mode. A thin layer of dust covered the appliances in the room, and she could see tiny fingerprints where some Resistance fighters had attempted to turn things on.

Leia was standing towards the front, barking out orders. “Wexley, Pava: see if you can get the ion cannon online— it should still be functional. Artoo and Threepio are working on getting power restored— generators are right below us, so we don’t have to worry about faulty wires. If we don’t at least have reserves, I’ll be shocked.” She paused, for barely a second, to clear her throat. “Finn, there’s an arsenal chock-full of blasters, explosives, you name it— down the hall and to the right. You can’t miss it. Ransack it, bring everything you can carry back here to Central Command. Rose, you help him. Poe, have BB-8 check the status of the X-wings we saw in the central hangar; see if any are operable and ready for battle.” Rey stood in awe. She had always known Leia as a general, not a princess, but now she presided over the scraps of the Resistance like a true leader. Everyone was listening, attentive, following her commands without discussion or delay.

Rey made her way towards the front slowly, patiently, inspecting displays and dashboards as she did so. Some of the technology she recognized, from scavenging on Jakku, but for the most part the devices were horribly outdated. When she got to Leia, she waited, watching the Resistance do her bidding. She cleared her throat after a long moment, and Leia jumped back, startled to see her.

“Rey. I thought you might be in the _Falcon_  already.” Leia’s face creased into a frown.

“Well… I just wanted to get the go-ahead from you.” She paused a beat. “Are you sure we’re going to pull this off?… With… _this_?” She gestured to the monitors crammed in the room. 

Leia shook her head, laughing under her breath. “It’s all we’ve got. We’re out of time to pick and choose. Hoth is the most defended base the Alliance ever manned, and she hasn’t failed us yet.” When Rey still looked apprehensive, Leia touched her arm, her eyes crinkling in reassurance. “The whole place looks better with the power on, anyway.”

As if on cue, the generators beneath them began to hum, and the computers blinked on, one by one. The corners of Leia’s lips turned up, her eyes alight. “See? I told you. And I _knew_ we had energy reserves.”

It comforted Rey, Leia’s confidence, in a strange way. She had to know there wasn’t going to be an easy way to win, and commanded the Resistance with the urgency it required, but she wasn’t pessimistic or withdrawn as expected. It occurred to Rey, in that moment, that perhaps this was where Leia felt at ease, and most at home— in the midst of war, with the manifestation of all that was evil in the galaxy on her heels. 

Leia caught her eyes again, and smiled. “Go on to the _Falcon_. We’ll need her air defense any minute now. If we need to speak to you, we’ll use base comms.” She grasped Rey’s hands then, her fingers warm and steady. “May the Force be with you, Rey. And thank you.”

Her eyes pierced Rey, cutting her to the bone. She felt transparent, as if Leia could see everything her soul contained. In that moment, she feared the general knew of the link Rey shared with her son, that she could sense it vibrating through their touch. But the moment passed, and Rey slipped her hands from Leia’s. She turned away from her, walking out of the room, pushing down her emotions as she said goodbye to the only semblance of a mother she’d ever known.

Rey made her way down to the _Falcon_ , and to its cockpit, where Chewie was switching between fiddling with the controls and fending off the occasional porg. She plopped down in the co-pilot’s seat, resting her cheek on one fist. No one had any idea how long it would be before the First Order was at their doorstep, and the bond had been largely ignored by her since she had disconnected with Ben last. She rationalized that it would make things easier, make it easier for her to fire on the First Order. The silence on the other end made her conclude that he was thinking in the same vein. The idea of turning back to her previous thoughts— to thinking about him—made her stomach twist. 

Suddenly, the Falcon’s subspace radio began to beep, and Rey leaned forward to switch on the built-in comlink, and tune into the channel. “ _Falcon_ co-pilot speaking.” 

“ _Falcon_ , this is Lieutenant Connix, testing comms to the ship from Echo Base, central command.” The radio crackled, and Connix’s voice was distorted, but the message still came through.

“We hear you, Centcom.” Chewie roared next to her for effect. Rey smiled.

“General’s orders are for you to begin patrol while Commander Dameron fires up the X-wings. If you see any sign of the First Order, or anything pops up on the radar, report back, and keep comms open. It’ll be a two-man crew for you guys going into battle, so good luck.”

“Copy that.” Rey’s voice was quieter this time. “Good luck to you all down there.”

Rey leaned back as Chewie fired up the thrusters, flashing the ship’s beams at the men minding the now-closed hangar door. “So this is what we’ve got. A Corellian freighter, a handful of X-wings, and two dozen fighters, all housed in a long-abandoned base.”

Chewie growled next to her. “Odds have been worse.” 

Rey raised an eyebrow at him, smirking. “With the stakes just as high?” 

The Wookiee could only shrug at that, grabbing the yoke with two furry hands and propelling the _Falcon_ forward, out of the base and into the frigid air. The hangar door creaked, then slammed shut behind them.

The slopes of packed snow seemed to stretch on forever, with the occasional mountain or glacier breaking up the horizon. The landscape directly preceding Echo Base was dotted with overturned AT-ATs. Rey felt a strange yearning for her old home, for the Walker she had lived in for years on Jakku. Once they cleared the entrance and began circling the radius of the base, the planet looked empty, eternally uninhabited, and certainly devoid of any evidence of the First Order. For now. Above the horizon, massive forms of gray, ominous clouds dominated the skyline. Initially, Rey initially thought the storm harmless, and far off, but flecks of snow dotting the viewport soon turned into an all-out blizzard, obscuring their vision and forcing them to turn back.

Rey leaned into the comlink. “Centcom, this is Falcon pilot. There’s a snowstorm approaching quickly from the south. Look out and be careful— it could approach during battle.”

Connix sent back instantly. “Copy that, Falcon. Thanks for the intel.”

The patrol went smoothly, but there was a ball of anxiety and tension building in the pit of Rey’s stomach. Continually searching for any sign of the enemy wore down on her mind, on her emotions. The calm banality of the snow slopes below them, of the motionless clouds ahead, reminded Rey of the peaceful quiet before a Jakku sandstorm. The placid beauty of the planet wasn’t lost on her, even if the cold was a bit intimidating after years living in a desert. But it was tinged by the sentry they conducted, to what end they were serving by acting as watchmen. It sent shivers down her spine to think about, and she let the tense, focused quiet between her and Chewbacca grow.

Eventually, they had to turn around to face the clouds again, which were growing darker, and moving faster. Rey scanned the ground below her, and the horizon ahead, with exacted vigilance, leaving the piloting to Chewie as she acted as sentinel. The farther out they moved, the spottier their communications with Echo Base were, and Rey mentally calculated the range they could attack at without losing connection with the Resistance. She was logging the distance into the ship’s computer when the comlink blipped with sudden interference.

“What was that?” Rey looked at Chewie, eyes dark with concern. The Wookiee could only shrug.

She thrust her hand out towards the comlink desperately. “Centcom, was that you?”

There was a short delay before Connix returned the transmission. “What was what?”

“We just had a bout of interference with communications over here.” 

“Well, it wasn’t us—“

“Copy that.” She slammed down the comlink. “Chewie, activate the decloaking device. I think something’s hiding out there.”

The space in front of her, in the thick of the clouds, shimmered, slowly at first, and then all at once. She stood from her co-pilot seat, gradually, mouth agape, as the clouds became darker, more black than gray. And then a shape emerged from them.

The _Supremacy_. 

Rey grabbed for the comlink. “Echo Base, I have eyes on a Mega-class Star Dreadnought, straight ahead— almost 50 miles out from Echo Base, and moving quickly. Do you copy, Centcom?” 

The response was almost instantaneous. “We copy, _Falcon_. Preparing as we speak. Maintain a defensive position and return to base.”

“Understood.” Rey whipped around to her co-pilot. “You got that?” 

Chewie gave a quiet roar of assent. 

“I’m going down below.” She ran out of the cockpit and through the main corridor, down the ladder and into the gunning station. She leaped into the seat, grabbing the headset from its hook by the entrance and strapping it on. “Can you hear me, Chewie?”

She heard him roar over the connection, and smiled despite herself. “Alright. Let’s go.”

The Wookiee piloted the ship back to base speedily, and Rey kept her gun trained on the _Supremacy_ as it closed in on the _Falcon_. There was no way the guns on the freighter would even make a dent in the Dreadnought, and as long as they were on defense, Chewie couldn’t get close enough to take out any surface cannons. Rey sighed, leaning back, but staying in place, her eyes focused on the ship behind them.

It was closing in at an alarming rate. The _Supremacy_ must have been using their atmospheric thrusters, instead of maintaining speed, to get to the base as fast as possible. She tapped against the gun control’s wiring nervously, brows furrowing in anxiety as the distance between the two ships tapered. “Chewie, they’re closing in fast— you’ve got to move!”

Chewie roared back, and the _Falcon_ kicked into auxiliary power Rey didn’t know it had. She checked the rear radar of the gunning station quickly, and saw that Echo Base wasn’t too much farther ahead. She bit her lip in anticipation. “Come on, come on.” 

A bolt of energy whizzed past the ship, so close to the ship’s blasters Rey thought their emitters might be fried. They’re already firing on us. “Great maneuvering,” She murmured into the communicator. She reached for a switch against the wall, and the gun’s quad scope blinked on, a red screen with orange lights. The _Supremacy_  was too big for the scope to pick up on, but she could already see a handful of TIE fighters emerging from the Dreadnought’s main hangar, flickering onto her radar. They gained speed on the _Falcon_ quickly, and Rey took one out with a well-timed shot before it could get close enough to fire back. The flat wings of the ship fell into the snow with a quiet hiss.

Echo Base was suddenly spread out beneath her, as Rey realized they had made it back in the nick of time. Gunners defended a second open hangar door, and a few fighters had hollowed out spaces on the base roof, pointing rifle blasters across the field. The ion cannon crowning the main portion of the base was powered on and pulsing, ready to fire. Dozens of TIE fighters were leaving the _Supremacy_ now, heading towards the base in droves.

“ _Falcon_ gunner, engage in attack with those TIE fighters and use evasive maneuvers!” Connix’s voice through the headset was urgent. “You've got support coming from us.” 

Rey tore her eyes from the _Supremacy_ , now stationary a few kilometers away from the base, to watch the formation of X-wings fly from behind the glacier and towards the Dreadnought. She counted five in all— not an entire squadron, but enough to defend the base. 

“Follow my lead, _Falcon_.” Poe’s voice crackled over the communicator, and Rey could see his X-wing, leading the group, fly arcs over the base and towards the squadron of TIE fighters. The rest of the cluster of ships followed suit, and Chewie swung around to catch up, nearly giving Rey whiplash as her seat swiveled violently to accommodate. 

“Alright, guys. The X-wings are gonna go in on the offense— take out as many of those surface cannons as you can, and any ground fighters you see, but don’t forget about their air support. _Falcon_ , I want you to focus on the TIE fighters— they’re gonna be trying to take us out, but you need to be faster. Rey, put all your fire on those ships.” 

Rey nodded. “Copy that, Poe.”

“X-wings, in formation!” Poe shouted over the connection. Rey’s heart was going a mile a minute, leaping into her throat at the commander’s words. Chewie settled the Falcon over the X-wings’ arrangement. And battle began.

A TIE fighter leapt right in the middle of the formation almost immediately, eager to take out the Resistance’s air team. Rey took him out with an easy shot, her seat revolving as she pressed on the control pedals, looking for any ships accompanying the lone fighter. The X-wings raced forward, full speed towards the Supremacy, and Chewie held back, positioning the ship such that Rey could fire upon the squadron of TIE fighters heading for the formation. The group zoomed ahead, firing on the Supremacy’s surface cannons, some shots hitting true while many missed. Rey fired on the TIE fighters speeding forward to defend their main ship, missing her mark on only one, which Poe caught during his return back to the front.

The cycle continued like that for a time, X-wings speeding forward and firing on the _Supremacy_ in rounds, with the _Falcon_  running behind to pick off TIE fighters. Rey felt connected and attuned to the Force; sometimes she could put a gunning bolt straight through the cockpit of a TIE fighter before she knew what she was doing, and then turn to fire on another. The ion cannon behind them would fire intermittently, leaving bigger dents in the Dreadnought or taking out entire droves of TIE fighters. But for every well-timed shot the Resistance exacted, there would be a downed X-wing, or fighter returning to base for fear of crashing into the _Supremacy_. They were giving it all they had, but it still wasn’t enough.

“ _Falcon_ , we need you to pull back— we’ve knocked out as many cannons as we’re gonna get.” Poe’s voice was strong, but unsure, over her communicator.

Chewie slowed up, swinging the freighter around. “What’s going on?” Rey shouted over the noise of the engine, keeping her eyes on a pair of ships before downing both with a single shot.

“We’ve got Walkers by the base— too big for the rifle blasters, too small for the ion cannon. You know what to do.”

Rey swiveled around to see a dozen Gorilla Walkers beginning a slow march towards the base’s entrance, puffing up bouts of snow with each cumbersome step. Their guns were already focusing power on the hangar doors, which were thankfully shielded, with the occasional shot up to the fighters above the entrance. A few fighters had gone out onto the snowy battlefield, carrying blasters in one hand and flat slabs of scrap metal to act as shields in the other. They fired incessantly on the underbellies of the Walkers, but as the snowstorm pressed down on them, she found them nearly impossible to spot. The _Falcon_ caught up quickly, and Rey wasted no time unleashing a bombardment of blaster fire on the Walkers. She took down one after a few minutes of careful maneuvering, and a shouting match with Chewie about not getting close enough. Her immense satisfaction was hard to resist when she finally saw it topple over into the snow. The rest, however, kept marching on, paying no mind to the combined fire of the comparatively weak Resistance air fighters.

Rey leaned into her headset. “Poe, those things are _heavily_ armored. We won’t be able to take them all out in time; they’ll reach the hangar doors before we’ve downed half of them.” 

“We’re giving it all we’ve got, Rey! There’s— _TIE fighter on your left!_ ” Poe cut off, warning Rey in the nick of time. She swiveled around, pressing hard on the firing grips, and caught the TIE fighter moments before it collided with her viewport. The ship fell away, so close she had been able to see the shiny black helmet of the pilot controlling it, and the flurry of falling ice absorbed the TIE fighter's outline before she could see it hit the ground. She swallowed, reaching for another fragment of courage inside herself. 

She put blaster bolts through two more TIE fighters in a matter of seconds before fuzzy interference buzzed in her ears, bringing her back to Poe. “There’s too many— we’re taking fire from all sides!”

“We’re going to— ground assault— I repeat, _fall back_!” Poe’s voice cut in and out, and Rey recognized the distortion. _The blizzard’s getting stronger— it must be limiting the comms on those old X-wings._ Chewie fell back to base, planning maneuvers to hover over a still-firing ion cannon as Rey dished out more shots on the Walkers. 

“There’s no way we’re clearing out all those things,” Rey said under her breath as her fingers held down the triggers nonstop. “Chewie, what are we doing to do?”

“Incoming, _Falcon_! We’ve got company!” Poe’s voice was almost a laugh as he yelled into his own communicator.

“What?” Rey murmured, leaning forward to peer out of her viewport. She couldn’t make out anything between the impending clouds and constant snowfall. Even reaching out with the Force, she felt nothing. And then…

Three dozen starfighters of different makes and sizes tore into the space above Echo Base, barely decelerating in time to turn around and begin firing on the Walkers. Her mouth broke into a grin as she recognized the symbol flash-painted on the tops and bottoms of their wings: the resurrected symbol of the Rebel Alliance. The seal of the Resistance.

“Rey! Grab your weapons— need you down on the ground. Chewie, regroup at— hangar. Leave the air fight to our saviors.” She could hear Poe’s smile through the shaky comms channel, and Chewbacca’s triumphant roar of concurrence. 

Rey untangled herself from the mess of the gunning station, climbing up the ladder and into the corridor with haste as Chewie loaded the Falcon into the rear hangar door. She stopped by her quarters long enough to fish out Anakin’s lightsaber, which she had messily fused together with a few carbon wires and some bonding a day ago. It fizzled in her hands when ignited, as if threatening to sputter out and die at any moment, and didn’t produce a stable beam of light, but for the time being, it worked. She rummaged through a storage locker, finding Han’s old blaster, and tucking it into her belt loop, before dashing out of the room and along the hall. The _Falcon_ 's rear ramp door was still hissing open when she approached it, so she hopped out before the slab of metal could hit the ground. She turned away from the ship without a second glance and ran full-speed towards the battlefield, lightsaber gripped in her hands, primed for a fight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew ok! So that was a lot— I know it was a lot for me to research/write, I hope it wasn’t too overwhelming to read. I also don’t normally write combat, especially space combat, so that took some extra research. If you guys have any questions (or just wanna say hi lol) don’t hesitate to leave a comment and I’ll try and answer to the best of my ability. I was happy to get this written and uploaded earlier than anticipated, but next chapter is gonna be even longer/meatier so expect another week before I can get it up. Thanks again for being so patient everyone, and thanks for reading!!


	7. VII

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Even if he could find her in this storm, in this battle, and they could make it out unharmed and alive, there wasn’t a place in the Galaxy where their pasts wouldn’t follow them._

His side burned. The snow stung.

Kylo Ren remembered commanding Hux’s armies from the _Supremacy_ , taking blaster fire from X-wings. He remembered allowing his anger to come to the forefront of his mind, deploying the heavy assault Walkers, and droves of TIE fighters. He remembered resisting the urge to slam his fists on the console when he saw a new fleet of Resistance air squadrons coming out of hyperspace. He remembered ordering his Upsilon shuttle to land in the midst of the snowstorm, remembered Hux’s look of incredulity but acquiescence as he ordered the ship prepared. He remembered needing to tap into the darkness inside him. He remembered that aching call to kill something.

After that, his memories had become blurs of color: the deep black of his cape swirling around him as he executed his forms in a blind rage, the brilliant red light of his flickering lightsaber, the stain of crimson blood on fresh white snow. And the storm raged on and on, gaining speed and strength through it all.

There couldn’t have been many Resistance fighters on the ground, but he had lost count of how many he had killed. Useless stormtroopers had surrounded him, flanking him, firing futile shots at heads that would pop up behind makeshift shields, trying to land a bolt at the First Order’s Supreme Leader. Ren was just starting to get cocky about the whole thing when he suddenly took a blaster bolt to the side, crippling him and breaking him out of his reverie of death and destruction. The wound kept him out of the fight for a few sobering minutes while he grappled for strength. He recalled the fight in the forest he had had with Rey— thoughts of her sent spasms of pain through him— where he had beat his wound from Chewbacca’s crossbow blaster to give him strength. When he tried it now, it only heightened the pain, blurring his focus.

Snow flew into his eyes, blinding him. He could barely see the battlefield ahead of him; if he hadn’t been wearing black, it would have been difficult to distinguish between snow and self. When he looked down at his feet, he noticed spatters of dark blood raining down from his wound. He ground his teeth, searching for any reserve of strength he had. As if on instinct, he found himself reaching towards the bond he shared with Rey. But she was still closed off to him, her emotions pure focus, pure synchrony with the Force. A part of his mind, the part Snoke had cultivated and was now the voice for, told him to keep going, to put his saber through as many lousy Resistance fighters as he could. If he died, it would be an honorable death, fighting the scum that forever sowed dissent and chaos in the threads of the Galaxy.

_But I don’t want to die this way._

It was a staggering thought, one that shocked him to his core. Since he had forsworn the Light, forsaken his family and his past, he had privately wished for the day when his conflict would end. If he couldn’t find true Darkness, if he could never give up all of the Light, then what point was there to living? He would serve as a means to Snoke’s end, and die committing himself to whatever task his master assigned. But would his conflict be over if he died serving darkness? Even that day, on Starkiller Base, when he had shoved his lightsaber through Han Solo’s heart, there had been a part of him that felt the pull of his own words. _I want to be free of this pain. Will you help me?_ At the last moment, he could have turned the weapon, could have pressed the switch and let himself die. But because there was the slightest chance the death of his father might bring him to the Dark, he had chosen to stay alive. But, of course, it hadn’t worked. And here he was, regretting ever telling himself that death would be noble. That death was what he wanted.

Now, he glanced up, eyes connecting with the stormtroopers surrounding him uneasily. They still fired blindly into the snowstorm, hoping one of their bolts would make contact with a Resistance fighter. It made him sick. 

Why was he even pretending anymore? Ren wasn’t the Supreme Leader the First Order needed, or even wanted. He knew how Hux craved the position he held, how he wanted to desperately to rip it from his hands and complete the cycle of ruination Ren resisted. And he didn’t want this either; with Snoke dead, and his grip on the Darkness faltering, he knew it was only a matter of time before the dissent inside him swallowed him up. Right now, he could lose himself in this storm, run from the Resistance, the Order, either to die, or to kill his past and start anew. That’s what he truly wanted. He could find Rey— another spasm of pain echoed in him— could live with her, shedding the baggage of choosing sides and live in true balance with the one person who had ever understood him.

But beneath this pleasant, peaceful facade he was creating for himself, he felt a note of dismal truth ring true: he could never do away with the past, and Rey couldn’t either. Even if he could find her in this storm, in this battle, and they could make it out unharmed and alive, there wasn’t a place in the Galaxy where their pasts wouldn’t follow them. 

So he had to make a choice. He didn’t relish it, didn’t savor the decision he would come to, but he knew there was no place for him here in the fight to survive, no place toeing the line. 

Still leaned over, one hand sinking into the snow to steady himself, he closed his eyes, tapped into the Force humming inside of him. Both Luke and Snoke had tutored him on this tactic, this exercise. _When even your own mind fails, the Force will help you decide._ And so he let it.

Images and visions, some he recognized and some he didn’t, flowed through him. His mother and father, much younger, holding an infant. Leia conducting senatorial meetings on Coruscant. Han zipping into hyperspace on board the _Millennium Falcon_. Luke Skywalker, at the temple school, meditating alongside a circle of students. Rey, running through a desert, her staff gripped in hand. Fires ripping through a circle of buildings. Red comets of light destroying planet after planet. Snoke’s face, grinning, before burning into ashes. Thousands of people, representing a dozen alien races, crowded around a single coffin. 

_Birth. Death. Growth. Destruction._

_Light._

_Darkness._

_And between it all…_

His eyes snapped open, startled. His choice was made. For better or worse, he knew what had to be done.

And so he ignited his lightsaber and drove it through the body of the stormtrooper closest to him.

* * *

Rey stopped in her tracks, suddenly unable to catch her breath, as though she had been kicked in the stomach. She felt like a great weight had been dropped through the center of her, tipping the scales tying her together. She had to lean on the outside of the base to keep herself from falling over.

Finn spotted her, from a few feet away on the battlefield, and ran towards her. “Rey!… Are you okay?” His voice was loud, shouting over the thrashing winds.

_The Force…_  Ben. _He’s out there. He needs me. I have to find him._

She felt Finn’s hands on her arms and around her side, trying to help her up. Finally noticing his presence, she shrugged him off, hopping back to her feet. “No, no… I’m alright.” She met his eyes. “We need to keep moving.”

Finn gave her a look— he wasn’t entirely convinced that she was fine— but kept going, running alongside her as they dashed back into the fight.

The storm was everything now. The field ahead was blanketed in layers of white, some of the downed Walkers almost invisible under all of the snow. Cold winds buffeted them, and resisting the elements had become half the battle. Finn had salvaged a heavy parka from the base before the attack had begun, and when he had found Rey on the battlefield, he had pulled a similar coat off of a dead Resistance fighter and handed it to her. “It’s not keeping him warm anymore. You may as well use it.” It had insulated her at first, but as the battle raged on, she felt the arctic cold seep into her bones, freezing her from the inside out. It took every ounce of strength for her to keep going. 

Now they were plunging back into the battle, Rey still armed with her blaster in one hand, her broken lightsaber still in her pocket. She hadn’t gotten in close enough range to use the saber yet, but the blaster had come in handy. She had taken to hiding behind overturned Walkers, aiming errant shots at stormtroopers parading through the snow. The storm had made them harder to spot, with their white armor blending into the white background, but with enough concentration, and the help of the Force, she had been able to take some down. As the storm raged on, keeping the two sides from getting too close to each other, Rey kept searching for a tall figure, clothed all in black, among the lines of white stormtroopers. She tried tapping into the bond, but he was pure focus to her, his entire mind dedicated to his forms.

_His forms?_ Rey crouched down to lean against a Walker she was taking shelter against, gathering her thoughts. _But… he hasn’t infiltrated our ranks yet. If he’s focusing on forms— if he’s attacking… it’s not the Resistance._

As if on instinct, Rey reached into the pocket of her parka, her hand clasping around the frozen metal handle of Anakin’s mangled lightsaber. She pulled it out to inspect it, and rearrange the bent metal wiring holding the whole thing together. Taking one last deep breath, pulling on the Force to compose herself, she leapt up from her place behind the Walker and started running— saber in one hand, blaster in the other— towards enemy lines. 

Finn was the first to notice, and he didn’t bother hiding his discontent, just seconds after she started running. “Rey! _Rey!_ What are you _doing_?!”

“I have to find him!” She barely managed, over her shoulder as she continued her pace. Her words were probably lost in the wind, because a few seconds later, Finn was signaling the rest of the Resistance ground troops to advance, to follow her, getting closer without getting shot. She cursed Finn, cursed his love for her, his need to protect her, but the only signal she could muster was a raised hand and a hoarse “Fall back!” shouted into the storm. _Ben’s in trouble. I don’t have time. I have to find him._

The closer she got, the more stormtroopers risked cropping up from their hiding spots to fire a shot at her, but none hit their mark. Rey blocked each bolt with a well-timed parry from her lightsaber, the light of the blade fizzing, or ducking to miss multiple shots. She didn’t stop to fire back, only using her lightsaber to strike down the occasional stormtrooper blocking her path. Eventually she dropped the blaster back into her coat pocket, forgetting the need for it altogether as she raced through the storm, avoiding shot after shot as she searched for him.

Even with the what minimal light the snowstorm was allowing, she could tell a dimness had set over the battlefield. _The sun— it’s going down._ In an hour, the _Supremacy_ , the Echo Base, all of it, would be cloaked in darkness, in lethal subzero temperatures. She stepped faster, eyes narrowed, desperately searching for any sign of him.

Finally, as if appearing out of a mirage, she could make out a silhouette of black, gripping a sword bathed in red light, fighting off half a dozen stormtroopers. She could tell he was injured, badly; pain and agony rolled off of him in waves. _“Ben!”_ She didn’t know if she heard him over the sounds of the storm enveloping them, but the surge of emotion she sent down the Force was enough to break through his reverie. She saw him look around, his head whipping this way and that, looking for her, as he fought off the last of the stormtroopers. Rey sped up, picking up her legs to avoid getting stuck in the snow. She came to the fight just in time to take a stormtrooper through the stomach with her saber, saving Ben from a detrimental blow to the leg. He barely had time to look at her, to recognize her, before turning around and fending off another stormtrooper, this one armed with a stun baton. Rey turned to defend him, blocking another fighter, and the dance began.

When the last one fell, Rey killed her saber almost immediately, the unstable blade shrinking back into the handle, and ran to Ben. He had managed to cut down the last stormtrooper without assistance, but he was barely holding together, clutching his side as he took careful breaths between clenched teeth. At the sight of her, he collapsed again, falling into the snow, his own saber hissing at the contact with the snow before extinguishing. 

She fell with him, her arms on his face, his shoulders, checking for wounds. “What happened?” She hesitated. “Why were you… why were you fighting them?”

“You found me.” Ben’s voice was strained, restricted by the shallow breaths he was taking.

Her hand finally landed on his side, and he flinched, wincing as she pulled back. Her hand came back wet, and slick with blood. After her fingers had nearly frozen from exposure to the freezing winds, the heat of Ben’s blood almost felt good. She had to shove those thoughts aside, though, wiping the crimson blood on her white parka as she set to repairing him. “Do you think we could seal it… with the lightsaber?” Her voice was shaky; she had never handled serious wounds like this before, and had no idea what she was doing.

“No, don’t… don’t worry about that.” His breathing was more labored now, almost a whisper. “Rey… I know what I have to do. The Force— it showed me.”

“Ben.” Her voice was as quiet as his, her eyes trained on him, studying and memorizing every piece of him. _What happens if I lose him? I can’t lose him. I won’t lose him._

“We’ve always fought— always. But it can end now. We both have the Light and the Dark inside of us— some parts stronger than others, but we can never be rid of either. They’ll always be there.” Ben swallowed, gathering strength, before continuing. “Together— we can end it all. The fighting. The suffering. The _conflict_. It can be over, right now, all of it. With us.” He drew his hand away from his wound slowly, pulled the bloodied glove off, and extended his now naked fingers towards her. “Rey. Please.”

She felt the Force coursing through her, felt it dance along her bones as if her veins were rivers. The two of them were there, together, kneeling opposite one another. Absently, she realized it was the first time they had been close— actually _close_ , not using the Force— since she had been on board the _Supremacy_ , and even then, their proximity had been a necessity, fighting off Praetorian guards. Every muscle in her body yearned to reach out, to grab his hand and join him— _but at what cost?_ She remembered his first proposal to her. _Let it all die. We can bring a new order to the Galaxy._  Is that what he meant now?

But somehow… she knew this was different. Similar, but different. That version of Ben, the version that killed and destroyed without thought or consequence, was gone, she had to remind herself. She could even feel the change in him now. She reached into the bond, and found that same feeling of finality, of readiness, in his question. And all the reasons she thought of, reasons to say no, to leave him, to run away, all melted into nothing.

So she reached out, and her hand touched his.

When their skin made contact, a power unlike anything she had felt before began coursing through her. It was the Force, but more— forceful. It was the power of _them_. She felt everything. She was unstoppable and immovable, calm and a storm, a wave and a tempest, the sun and the moon, and it was all at once. When she met Ben’s eyes, when she probed their link, she knew he felt that same power, glowing in both of them, tying them together. The combination of their energy, of their oneness with the Force, mixed together to form these two equal parts, this light and dark that flowed through them both. For a moment, it terrified her— Kylo Ren possessing this terrible, potent power was nothing short of dangerous. But, as soon as it came, the thought passed. This wasn’t Kylo Ren. It was barely Ben. They were both something different now.

For that singular moment, they were one soul in two bodies, combined.

Ben rose to his feet and reached back, one hand outstretched, and as she slowly rose with him, Rey felt the power vibrating between them stretch and twist, radiating out from them. A red bolt of light erupted from one of the Walker cannons and careened towards them, then stopped mid-way. Rey felt Ben pulling on their Force to stop the bolt, then push it back, destroying the Walker it had come from. The other Walkers, still continuing their steady march towards the base, began to slow, then halt, as if an invisible wall was keeping them from stepping any further. His hand squeezed hers, his own oneness with the Force leaning on hers for strength.

Rey felt the answer. He was _showing_  her, instructing her on how to channel this, on what the Force had shown him. She saw the response he was asking for, the piece she was poised to fill. She stood fully with him, and pressed herself against his body, her hand reaching up, fingers pressing around the inside his outstretched forearm, feeding her energy into his and braiding it into one. She felt his other hand snake around her back, holding her closer, and as she did the same, their power surged. Rey pushed.

The Walkers crushed into themselves, metal crumpling and compounding until the forms lay motionless and smoking in the snow.

Rey breathed out, a moment of clarity allowing her to reflect on what was happening— what she was doing, what they were _both_ doing. But before either of them could ponder the destruction enacted by the raw strength thrumming between them, her mind probed out instinctively, and found the _Supremacy_. It was still in the thick of the snowstorm, hovering a little less than half a mile away. The power she shared with Ben snaked its way around the Destroyer. She could feel every inch of its surface, mapped out in her mind, each little divot and imperfection as clear to her as a bruise on her own skin.

She could feel Ben reaching out, too— towards Echo Base.  Their power was also reaching around the structure, stretching, examining the ins and outs of the building. She could feel him locate every warm body in that base, most of them clustered around central command. 

“Ben.” Her voice was just a whisper, breathed against his chest as he held her tightly to him.

He looked down at her, and the parts of them not consumed by this power shone through their eyes. She could see her own expression, drowning in the deep black of his irises.

“You know what we have to do.” His voice rang with reassurance, with conviction.

The power surged again, hitching to a level Rey thought they had already exceeded, vibrating between them as if on the brink of snapping, of exploding.

“It’s _balance_ , Ben. Remember that.” Her voice was quivering, small.

Ben could only nod, his understanding floating down to her without hesitation. His eyes showed her resoluteness, determination she had never seen before. Finality… but also an invitation. _We can end it now._ It took Rey a moment to realize she hadn’t imagined him saying the words— that he had spoken into her mind, sending those words down the bond.

She nodded back.

Their bodies separated, linked only by their hands intertwined. Her back facing Ben’s, inches apart from him, Rey turned towards the _Supremacy_. Slowly, carefully, she began gathering the power inside of her, pulling on Ben’s, weaving them together and surrounding herself with it. At the last moment, she looked behind her, back towards the base Ben was facing now, and caught Finn’s face, staring at her and Ben in awe. In fear.

She didn’t have time to warn him. The part of her indifferent to this power, indifferent to anything but her own emotions and feelings, wanted to scream at him, to beg him to _get down_. But there wasn’t time. She couldn’t even open her mouth. But she kept her gaze fixed on him, trying to send her plea to him just through her eyes.

It must have worked, because Finn ducked down moments later, and she could hear his voice over the sounds of the storm. _“Fall back! Take cover!”_

Another pulse of energy thrummed between her and Ben. She could feel him digging his heels into the snow, gathering his strength. Preparing himself. Between the snow and the setting sun, the battlefield was nearly dark. She closed her eyes, channeling the power.

_Together._

And the world erupted into a blaze of light.

* * *

When she came to, vision fuzzy and fading, the world was dimmer, and the snow was falling faster and heavier.

Her eyebrows knitted together, forehead wrinkling, as she squinted, arm raised against the snow. She couldn’t hear anything. Everything was quiet, and the snow fell.

A hand on her arm brought her back to the present, snapped her back to her senses. She brought her head up, and her eyes made contact with Finn’s immediately. A rush of relief coursed into her veins, a hint of a smile pulling at her lips. But his own expression showed nothing but distress, and anxiety.

“Rey? Rey! We have to _move_!”

She fully came to her senses then, idly remembering the events that had preceded her passing out. _How did I pass out?_ She took in her surroundings then, the flurries of snow masking bodies from both sides, lying in the ground. She could feel, through the Force, a downed _Supremacy_ , engulfed in flames, the occasional pod fluttering away from the wreck in a hasty escape. She turned her head towards the base, trying to reach out and _feel_  it, but something stopped her. _Someone._

“Where’s Ben?”

Finn’s mouth pressed into a hard line, and she knew that was the last thing he had wanted to hear. His head turned compulsively away from her, and when Rey scrambled out of the snow, she could see a form laying prostrate, just steps away from her.

She could see the rise and fall of his chest, and when she probed the bond between them, he was still _there_. But their connection was weak, and she saw how shallow his breathing was. She was next to him in an instant, hands on his chest, his side, checking the bleeding of his wound, the condition of his breaths. 

“Well?” Finn’s voice behind her was tinged with annoyance.

She couldn’t even look back to him. “He’s alive, but he’s losing more blood. He’s completely drained— and he’ll die of exposure if we don’t get him to shelter.”

Suddenly, the situation became quite clear to Rey. Finn wouldn’t help Ben, not of his own free will. Ben was still Kylo Ren to him, still the monster the rest of the Galaxy had made him out to be. She had to convince him.

“Finn—” Her voice was a murmur— “We have to help him. He’s not the man you think he is.” She swallowed, unable to keep the begging tone out of her voice. “ _Please_. You have to trust me.”

Finn’s face was an impasse, refusing to give her any indication that he was swayed by his words. She kept her eyes trained on him, every muscle in her body an indication of her desperate plea. Her hands had somehow snaked around one of Ben’s, holding on tightly to him, as if letting go would mean losing him forever.

“Okay.” The words were quiet, but still an admission of compliance, giving in to Rey’s demands. She only let herself have a moment of relief, of hope, before she pulled on Ben’s body, trying to hoist him upright without ripping at the wound on his side. 

“Help me with him— we’ve got to get him back to base— there’s got to be a med bay in there somewhere.”

She barely had him sitting up, one of his arms limply strung around her shoulders, when Finn came down to their level, reaching around Ben’s side and hauling him all the way up. They struggled with him for a few steps, trying to carry his entire weight. Rey held his torso, trying to keep his head from lolling back, while Finn struggled with his legs, one arm behind his knees, the other around his waist.

They had only made it a few yards before the both of them were breathing hard. “It’s useless.” Finn’s voice was strained as he struggled with Ben’s body. “We can’t get him all the way to base like this. He’ll bleed out before we get there.”

Rey stumbled, nearly dropping Ben as she reached around to staunch the wound at his side. “Stop, Finn! Stop.” They slowly lowered him to the ground, a few feet away from a rusted Walker, overturned in the snow.

“There’s no way we can take him all the way.” Finn repeated. There was no malice in his voice, no silent victory, only regret, mute understanding that his own nightmare was playing out in front of him, the same story with different actors. “I’m sorry, Rey.”

“No.” She didn’t realize she was crying until her voice cracked. Ben’s entire body lat still, unmoving, his face a silent impasse, void of energy. “No. There has to be a way.”

Finn touched her shoulder, his voice barely above a murmur. “Rey. We have to go.”

She broke away from Ben then, turning back to Finn. “Go back to Echo Base, Finn. Get help. Bring anyone you can, to help him. It’s the only way we can save him.”

Finn would have scoffed in disbelief, in any other circumstance but this. “Rey, I’m not going to leave you.”

“You have to.” Her voice ignited with newfound vigor. “You said you trusted me, didn’t you? You have to trust me now. Trust that I know what I’m doing.” She leaned over to take her friend’s hand. “Trust that I’ll survive this. Because he has to, too.”

Finn’s mouth hardened into a thin line. He squeezed her hand once, and she felt him looking for the right goodbye. But there was nothing that could be said between them, nothing that could make right now any easier. So he stood, grazing his eyes over him, over her, and then turned around and ran.

Rey followed the outline of Finn’s figure, sprinting through the storm, until the snow obscured him altogether, swallowing him into the void. Then she leaned back over Ben, one hand pressed firm against his side wound, the other flitting from his chest, to his shoulder, to his face. “Ben, please. _Please_. You have to wake up, Ben. _Ben_.” 

She reached into the bond, poured every ounce of emotion she had ever possessed down into it, screaming her pleas into his emptied mind. She felt her mouth open, every supplication her mind could grasp flowing past her lips and into the space between them. Kneeling by his prone, lying form, she felt the tears on her face fall onto the black of his clothing, soaking little jet-black circles into the dark uniform. She found his hand again, and her shaking fingers intertwined with his limp ones, her forehead pressed against his chest.

And then, as if recalling a shred of knowledge she had buried away long ago, she sensed the way. She could feel the Force again, flowing through her like icy water, a silent flame burning in her stomach. The world cleared again, and saw felt the solution, painted in front of her.

She placed her fingers delicately on his temple, her warm palm resting on his cold cheek. And she _pushed_.

Fatigue took hold of her almost immediately, settling into her bones. The energy that naturally rested in her body, keeping her upright and moving, flowed out of her fingers and into his own body. She pushed, and pushed, until she thought she had nothing left. In that moment, Ben’s eyes flickered open, and he took a sharp intake of breath.

Every muscle in Rey’s body wanted to lie down, wanted to close her eyes and succumb to the fatigue. But she kept pushing, allowed herself a smile and a sob, as a knot in her chest slowly eased and was replaced by a warmth that could not, _would not_ , be replicated.

“Rey.” It was just a whisper, but her heart soared at the sound of his voice.

“It’s me, Ben.” She still felt herself crying, tears still soaking his doublet, but they meant something different. “I’m here.”

She felt his hand come up to her head, fingers brushing through the wetness on her cheeks before cupping her face. “How…?” 

She knew his question before he had spoken. “Our souls are made of the same substance. Two halves of a whole, remember?” She laughed through the effort of keeping him conscious, her voice giddy despite the exhaustion. Her side was starting to hurt, her breathing labored as her ribs recoiled from an imperceptible wound.

His hand came down from her face to rest lightly on her own fingers, feeding her own life into him. “Stop. Don’t do this.”

“You would die if I didn’t.”

“Let me.”

Rey breathed out, her whispered voice fierce. “ _Never_.”

Ben’s breath hitched, and his hand closed around her wrist, not forcefully, but… carefully. As if she held on by a thread. The more energy she released into him, the more she drooped forward, like a wilting flower, her face sinking closer and closer to his. Her eyes were fluttering shut, the effort of keeping them open suddenly too much to bear.

And, when she thought she had nothing left, he craned his neck, and his lips reached up to find hers, and she rested there, pressed against him.

Then she fell back into the snow, and let everything fall away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so first off I just wanna apologize for the time it took to get this chapter uploaded. School and work have been crazy for me, and I ended up writing way more of this than I intended. Because of that, I'm adding on two more chapters so the work should end up being 10 in total. This chapter had to end up split into two parts (second part coming sooner this time I promise), and then I'm adding an epilogue as well. Anyways I really hope you all enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it, leave a comment if you'd like to as well. Thanks as always for reading!!


	8. VIII

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _He remembered Rey’s own desperation earlier, her self-control slipping when Kylo Ren had not woken up on her command. He cares for her. And, for better or worse, she cares for him, too._

Echo Base, surprisingly, was intact.

Finn had seen a few of the other Resistance ground fighters, the ones that had survived the initial blast, crawling back to base before he had had the chance to wake Rey. But when he arrived back at the main hangar door, he didn’t see a soul, and had to bang out the code on the metal siding to be readmitted.

The hangar door creaked open, exposing an empty, deserted hangar, with Rose waiting by the door’s controls. Her face was drawn, her uniform singed, and she avoided eye contact with him.

His initial question evaporated at the sight of the base, at the sight of his friend. “Rose… what’s happened?”

“You felt that blast, didn’t you?” Her voice quavered, and she had to look away. “We’ve lost so many… after all that help came, the air support, I came out here, looking for something to repair a comms device with down at central command. And then… then…” Tears started falling down her cheeks then, and Finn has to bring her close, let her grieve for just a moment, before time started moving around them again.

“Rose… you have to tell me where everyone is. Rey is out there, and… and she needs help. We have to help her.”

Her forehead crinkled in confusion at Finn’s insistence, eyes narrowing. “Finn… everyone’s gone. Central command was blocked off— a wall caved in during the blast. If anyone’s alive in there…”

Understanding floated between them. Finn forced his lips into a hard line, keeping his war face on. He scrambled for a solution, for anything. Any possibility of ensuring Rey's survival seemed to be slipping through his fingers, out of his control. The wind had started blowing flurries of snow into the hangar, flecks of white contrasting against the stark grey concrete.

“It’s getting dark out there.” Rose noted, an ascetic, almost defeated tone to her voice. “We should close up the door.”

“No.” The word was out of Finn’s mouth before he could stop himself.  “She’s out there, Rose. She needs our help.”

But Rose wasn’t listening anymore. Her eyes were trained on something behind Finn, something… out in the storm. “Who _is_ that?”

Finn glanced over his shoulder, stifling his irritation at the circumstances, and gaped.

A figure, tall and clothed entirely in black, was emerging from the foggy white winds of the storm, carrying... something. It was impossible for either of them to make out his features, anything discernible about him, until he got closer. Finn recognized the scar on his face, his pale white skin dotted with freckles, the black hair whipping past his cheeks and across his forehead. _Kylo Ren._

It wasn't Kylo Ren, though-- not the Kylo Ren Finn knew. His face was calm, an impasse, and he moved with none of the brute strength Finn would have recognized.

And then they both noticed what-- who-- they carried. The white parka was draped across her body, two lightsabers-- one held together by wiring, another with a black crossguard-- resting in her lap. Her eyes were closed, her head resting against Ren's bicep. He had one arm behind her knees, the other clasped around her shoulder. Faintly, Finn was reminded of that day, what felt like eons ago on Takodana, when the same man had carried the same girl. He wondered if the circumstances were different now.

Before Rose could react, or even open her mouth, Finn stepped forward. “Stop.”

To his surprise, Ren obliged, halting in his tracks. The snow still fell around him, gathering in the tendrils of his hair, and in Rey’s. Finn tried not to look at her, tried to hope for the best.

“You’re Kylo Ren.” Finn swallowed. “You’re the Supreme Leader of the First Order.”

Finn thought he saw a muscle in Ren’s jaw working. “Yes.”

“You’re an enemy of the Resistance.” It wasn’t hard for him to talk back to the man in front of him.

“He means you’re not coming in here.” Rose piped in from behind him. A glance back told Finn her arms were crossed, most her weight resting on one hip. Her entire body dared him to take another step towards them.

Ren pursed and unpursed his lips. He was seemingly unencumbered with Rey’s weight. “You’re FN-2187. A stormtrooper of the First Order. An enemy of the Resistance. And yet here you are, protecting the very movement you swore to defeat.” Ren didn’t need to finish his statement. Finn caught his drift, loud and clear.

Finn tried to pivot, avoiding the topic he so dreaded. “What happened out there? I thought you were on the brink of death.” Finn’s voice rose higher and higher, more upset as he continued. “Last I saw you, you were barely alive, Rey saying I had to trust her, to get _you_ help, and now I see _this_? _You_ carrying _her_  to safety?” 

“It doesn’t matter.” Ren’s voice was firm, but not aggressive. “Rey will die if she doesn’t get help.”

“And you’ll die if you don’t get inside, either.” Rose’s voice was cold, unfeeling. “Don’t think we don’t spot your motive here. That you two are a package deal.” Her tone dripped of sarcasm.

Ren sighed, shaking his head, before regaining his apathetic nature. “I’m not going to try and convince you two of something you don’t obviously believe. You’re strong in your convictions of my own malevolence. That’s fine.” Finn could see him swallow. “But she needs help.”

“She does.” Finn retorted. “And the only thing in the way of getting her inside is you.”

“You don’t understand.” Ren was quick to reply, his composure quickly melting away. Beneath that, though, wasn’t anger, as Finn might have expected, but instead a panicked desperation. “I… I don’t know how to explain this to you. But you _have_ to let us both in. She’ll know if I’m not there.”

Rose barked out a laugh. “And I’m sure she’d be happier for it.”

But the cogs were beginning to turn in Finn’s mind. He remembered Rey’s own desperation earlier, her self-control slipping when Kylo Ren had not woken up on her command. _He cares for her. And, for better or worse, she cares for him, too._

“Rose.” Finn’s voice was small. “Back off.”

She whipped around, eyebrows to her hairline. “ _What?_ ” 

Finn took a deep breath in, then out. It didn’t help. “Listen, what I’m about to do probably violates every Resistance protocol in the book. It’s going against every instinct I have. So just… cooperate with me.” He wasn’t looking at either of them, not speaking to anyone in particular. He was too busy mustering up the courage to do what needed doing. 

“The med bay’s shot— Connix said there’s nothing there worth salvaging. I think I saw some medical supplies on the _Falcon_ before we found the base. They’re probably still there.”

Rose scoffed. “I can’t believe you’re doing this, Finn.”

Finn whipped around, his impatience suddenly simmering to a boil. “I’m just trying to keep my friend alive. Wouldn’t you do the same?” Rose went to interrupt him, but Finn kept talking, not letting her get a word in. “You weren’t out there. You didn’t see what happened. That blast you were talking about, with the ground shaking…” He gestured towards Kylo Ren. “It was them. I know it.” He focused his attention on Rey’s form in Ren’s arms. Her face was still burrowed in Ren’s bicep, an eerie calm masking her features. “It was both of them.”

Ren took this as an invitation, and when he took a careful step forward, Finn didn’t stop him. Neither did Rose.

“Come on.” Finn’s voice was gruff, trying to mask any semblance of emotion. “I can take you to the _Falcon_. I know there’s a med pack in there.”

Ren kept walking, then running, as Finn and Rose led him through the labyrinth of the base, back towards the _Falcon_  resting in the rear hangar. The ship was apparently abandoned, the door ramp down and open. Finn led the way up, with Rose following behind Kylo Ren carrying Rey. Finn didn’t stop to see if Ren would hesitate boarding his father’s old ship, but his footsteps didn’t stop behind him, so he had to assume he was unaffected.

Once they were on the ship, though, Finn’s memory had seemingly failed him, and every drawer and closet he examined proved fruitless, and devoid of any medical supplies. Eventually, Ren took over, directing Finn on where to look while Rose cleared off a bench for Rey to lay on.

Finn had just found a gently used med pack in a storage container when he heard something.

“Leia.” Ren’s voice was just a breath, but Finn could hear it.

Finn turned around slowly. “Her, and most of Resistance high command, are trapped in the base.” He paused. “Rose didn’t sound optimistic.”

“No.” Finn could hardly place the emotion in Ren’s voice, but it was there. “No, they’re alive. _Someone_ is alive down there. She's calling to me. I can feel it-- I can feel _them_.” He faced Finn, Ren's eyes boring into his.

He swallowed. “Can you help them?”

“Yes.”

Finn glanced at Rey’s form in his arms. “What about…”

"She's dying." Finn didn't know who Ren was referring to.

“Here.” Rose cleared the last of the stuff from the bench they had chosen. Ren laid her down gently, like a sleeping child, but Finn could see his mind was obviously preoccupied.

“Go.” Finn’s voice was quiet. “We can take care of her.”

Ren took one last look at Rey, her eyes shut as her head leaned against the wall. “If she wakes up… please. Tell her I’m coming back.” 

Finn could only nod. At that, Kylo Ren turned around and left the ship.

* * *

_Ben. Ben. Ben._

The voice in his head was broken and shallow, but it pulsed erratically, like a failing heart. He was compelled to follow it.

Each intonation of his name was different, calling him back to a different part of his life.

_Ben._ Leia calling to him from the threshold of their home on Chandrila.

__Ben._ _ His mother chastising him over some holo documents for using the Force at the dinner table on Coruscant.

_Ben._ Her saying goodbye as she boarded the _Falcon_  and left him with Luke at the temple school.

His head ached, and he had to stop himself from reaching out towards his bond with Rey. He hated abandoning her there— hated that after she had given him everything, he had left her. But there was nothing that could be done.

The voice led him out of the _Falcon_ , out of the hangars, and through the twisting corridors of the base. He had no sense of passing time, no sense of anything but that voice, pounding through him.

He knew he was getting closer— he could feel the voice getting louder and more insistent, and when he came upon a collapsed piece of wall blocking a corridor, he knew what he had to do.

Suddenly, the voice stopped, and his mind was quiet again.

He probed out nervously. _Leia._  He paused. _Mother._

Nothing.

He gathered every ounce of strength he could feel inside him, tapping into a seemingly unlimited source of power. He felt unbalanced, with his connection with Rey being ignored for the time being, but he could still muster enough of the Force within him.

He thrust a hand out and channeled the power towards the collapsed wall.

It lifted with ease, pressing back into the wall, and exposed a crushed metal door. The door swung open with a flick of his fingers, revealing a wrecked command center.

He took a deep breath, and attempted to approach the situation with an ascetic calm.

The corridor wall had apparently collapsed into the room, wrecking a few base computers along the left wall. The entire room looked as if it had been placed in a jar and shaken about. Parts of the ceiling were missing, and wires were falling from the walls. Computers were overturned, a display had shattered, leaving glass sprayed over half of the room, and the opposite wall had also caved in, crushing another set of computers.

And there were dead and dying everywhere.

Anyone still capable of using their body was rushing from person to person, checking their status. Only a handful were actually able to get up and walk, though, and even then they were staunching their own wounds as they tended to others.

And then his eyes connected with Leia, huddled in the back corner.

Any semblance of placidity he was approaching the situation with quickly crumbled, and he hastily pushed through the metal doorway to get to her.

As soon as he made himself known, though, the entire room froze. Those who had been flitting from patient to patient stopped to stare at him. At first, it confused him, the entire room stopping at the sight of him, but he remembered himself then. _The leader of the enemy just walked through their doors without killing anyone._

He ignored them, though. He didn’t have time to explain anything that had happened, how the tables had turned outside these walls. 

She was situated between the wall and an overturned chair, breathing shallowly as low-ranking Resistance officers flitted around her, trying to help. He was next to her in a heartbeat, though, kneeling next to her lying form.

“Ben.” Her voice mirrored that which had been echoing in his head before. It was weak, barely eking out of her throat, and it made him want to destroy something.

“What happened.” His voice was flat, his eyes not tearing from his mother. 

“One of the walls fell on her.” Connix was meek and wary, her voice quavering, but the only one out of any of them brave enough to speak up. “And then the ceiling caved in.”

"Ben." Leia whispered again. "I thought you were... gone forever." Her breathing was labored.

He swallowed, trying his best to keep the emotion out of his voice. "I guess I wasn't."

Everyone else backed away, retreating to the opposite side of the room, while he fell to his knees by Leia, lying there. Dying.

"Are you in pain?" It was a stupid question, but the only one that came to his mind. "Is there... anything I can do?"

When Leia smiled, it brought him back to his childhood, all those years ago. "No. You've done enough. Being here, now... it's enough."

He felt himself breaking inside. "I don't want you to die." His voice broke. "I would take it all back-- all those foolish years I spent with Snoke-- I would take it all back to keep you alive right now."

"The past... is the past, Ben. We can't change it. We can only take it in stride."

"I failed you. And I failed... I failed Han, too."

"We both failed you, Ben. And I’m sorry.” Leia touched his forearm, and he instinctively reached out to grab her hand with both of his. “I always thought Snoke was the reason you left us. But deep down… I really knew. We abandoned you.” She coughed to the side, her brow furrowing in pain, and he had to steel himself to stay with her. “All those years when Han was gone… when I left you alone to attend stuffy Senate meetings… I regret it all. I was raising the New Republic when I… when I should have been raising you.”

He froze. He couldn’t move. He felt himself shaking.

Leia squeezed his hand. “I love you, Ben. I’ve always, always loved you.”

His eyes stayed trained on her, his gaze locked to hers. In that moment, he saw every version of her he had ever known. From a freshman senator hot off the heels of winning the Galactic Civil War, to a seasoned general leading her last rebel force. And through it all, he realized, no matter how much he had pretended to loathe her, to loathe being a Solo, she had always been his mother.

“I love you.”

She smiled, just the slightest upturn of her lips. And then she was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter is so much shorter than the last few!! I wanted to kind of wrap up the main battle and then go straight into the final chapter, which I'm in the process of writing right now, and then the epilogue. I'll admit that last scene was a heartbreaker to write, and I just hope I did it justice haha. Thank you guys all so much for reading!!


	9. IX

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Arriving in his cell _was too delicate a phrase for what had happened. But he couldn’t find the energy to describe it any other way. His mother was dead, his crippled army and their unscrupulous general stranding him here, and the Resistance’s new leader seemed intent on shipping him off to an eternity of imprisonment rather than involve him in the rebel group in any capacity._

The relief ships, as it turned out, had come from Chandrila. 

Mon Mothma later sent a comms memo to the systems on Hoth, confirming her involvement in the Resistance’s victory. As soon as she had received Leia’s personal code through Chandrila’s governmental communications, the limited military strength the planet possessed had been diverted to Hoth. Those ships would later be recognized as the saving grace of the Resistance. 

Poe was poring over various documents surrounding him— tech repair transcripts, death certificates, arrest warrants. His head swam as he tried to make sense of any of this, reports blurring together. The New Republic Senate had apparently regrouped on Coruscant, and was demanding a complete battle report of the events from the top-ranking member of the Resistance.

Which now, apparently, was him.

Poe tried to concentrate on the records in front of him, but his mind kept drifting back to the events of the past few days. The battle itself— the relief ships— and then, as the First Order began backing off, the blast itself. Everything after that had been a blur. Finn and Rose jamming the comms channel, warning anyone that was listening that Kylo Ren had infiltrated the base. Then, another, much worse message, this one from central command— that General Leia Organa had taken her last breath. That was when he had grounded his X-Wing, running across the hangar and through the base, only to find Kylo Ren in cuffs, a shell of a person as Leia’s body was carried away.

He was still there now, imprisoned deep down, inside the base, with at least half a dozen Resistance members guarding his room at any given time. Poe had considered going down to question him early on, but when he got there, he couldn’t even think of anything to say. Ren had been huddled in the corner, mutely staring at his hands as if Poe wasn’t even there. After a few minutes of silence from both of them— Poe mustering up any semblance of a question, with Kylo just ignoring him— Poe had stormed out, red-faced and confused as to how he gotten here. Not just at Ren’s cell, but at the top of the Resistance. For years he craved a position of leadership like this one, but now that he was their ringleader, all he wanted was to jump back in his X-Wing and fly away. 

He scrubbed his hands over his face, days of stubble on his jaw scratching at the pads of his fingers. More than anything, he missed Leia. He hadn’t quite processed the fact that she was gone yet. He still felt an impulse to report to her command, and would have to stop himself from seeking her out at the last moment. He kept forgetting she really was gone. Her corpse had been sent to Chandrila at the insistence of Mon Mothma, who had already begun sending out invitations to every corner of the galaxy to come celebrate the life of the last of the oldest rebel heroes. Poe had received his yesterday, and left it unopened, the message on the holoscreen floating on the outskirts of the notes in front of him.

He heard a knock at the door of his makeshift office, and he assented entry with a simple “Who is it?” mumbled through his hands. When the door _whizz_ ed open, though, it was Finn. He looked slightly less haggard than Poe probably did, but still not in prime condition. Bags had begun to form under his eyes, and his hair was unkempt. 

“Hey.” The word carried tacit emotion, an unspoken empathy. He came around to sit next to Poe’s desk. “Everything okay?”

Poe gestured with one hand at the array of viewscreens and holos showing several open reports and documents, before leaning back in his chair and sighing. “I haven't slept-- truly slept-- in days. I can barely focus. And the mountain of paperwork only ever gets bigger.” As if on command, a _blip_  sounded from one of the holos, signaling another incoming message. He briefly scanned the summary— another damage report from a low-ranking technician— before swiping it aside to review later.

“You shouldn’t have to do this all alone.” Poe felt Finn’s hand on his arm, squeezing his shoulder. “If you begin assigning a new high command, then—“

“I know.” Poe cut him off. “I’m just— I’m not ready yet.” Poe looked up from the holos to make eye contact with Finn.

“I know.” Finn repeated, again with empathy. “Look, the med team said they’re planning to wake Rey up in the next hour or so. I figured you would want to go say hello, bring her up to speed, things like that.”

Poe thought on it for a moment. “It _would_ be nice to get away from all this for a second. I probably need to question her about what happened, too.” Finn had briefly touched on how Rey had become incapacitated— the explosion, her desperation over an unresponsive Kylo Ren, who miraculously brought them both through Echo Base just minutes later. There were too many questions, and neither Poe nor Finn trusted Ren to answer them truthfully. So the issue had been tabled until Rey was responsive. 

“I would just be careful— you know, asking about Kylo. She was really sensitive about it, the last time we, ah, spoke.” Finn reminded him fervently as they left the office and walked down to the makeshift med bay.

The room, longer than it was wider, was filled to the brim with the injured, some critically, who had managed to survive the last battle. Those with minor wounds, such as blaster burns or broken bones, had been grouped towards the front of the hall, lying on tables or sitting on stools while medics tended to them. The farther down they walked, though, the more serious the conditions of the patients got, with some encased in bacta suits, others clutching their wounds as they attempted sleep. Finally, at the very end of the room, was one single, solitary bed, isolated in privacy. Rey lay so still that, if Poe didn't know any better, he would have thought her dead. Her skin was pale, the freckles dotting her face more defined than usual, and one arm was slung over her midsection, clutching a now-bandaged side. Various machines beeped out her vital signs, and every so often a medic would come to check one of them. 

Rose was already there, clutching Rey's other hand, smoothing back her hair. When Poe and Finn approached, she gave both of them a sad smile. "Hey, Poe. I haven't seen you in forever."

Poe heard a series of familiar beeps resonating behind Rose's legs, and his brow furrowed in confusion. "...BB-8?" He leaned down.

The droid rolled out from behind Rose, beeping as though he had been caught in the act. Poe's voice took on a clipped, serious tone as he bent down. "I thought I told you to focus on repairs in the power sector."

"I'm sorry." Rose blurted. "I found him over by the new centcomm, and I just couldn't go see Rey without bringing him along... I know he would want to see her right now."

After a moment, Poe nodded. "No, I understand.” BB-8 beeped sadly in complement as he stood again.

Rose paused a moment, her eyes glued to her hands. “Have you gone to visit him?”

Everyone knew who she was talking about. “Yes.” Poe’s voice was quiet. “But… we didn’t speak.” He scrambled for another explanation, a reason why he couldn’t seem to complete his duties as the new leader of the Resistance, but a sense of mute understanding passed throughout the group, and they fell silent again.

Moments later a pair of medics approached Rey’s bed, armed with syringes and medical patches. “We’re ready to induce consciousness.”

As if on instinct, Finn grabbed Rey’s other hand, with Rose still gripping the other. One of the medics reached for Rey’s wrist, and began injecting a clear liquid into her arm. Poe noticed Rose look away, squeamish at the sight of needles, but Finn kept his eyes trained on the medic’s actions.

First, Rey’s brow furrowed, her forehead crinkling, as if her body was resisting consciousness. Then her lashes began to flutter, her lids opening halfway, and then pressing shut again. A quiet groan, muted enough for only their group to hear, elicited from her form, and Poe saw Finn squeeze her hand again. Then her lids slid open, refusing to close, and her gaze met Finn’s.

“Finn?”

“Rey.” Finn broke out in a grin, his eyes misty.

“Where am I?” Her brow was still furrowed, confusion and disorientation painted plainly on her face.

“We’re still on Hoth.” Poe spoke up, stepping forward. He tried his best to smile in a comforting way, given the situation at hand. “In a makeshift med bay. The battle is over.” He paused, grasping at any other information he would need to fill in for her. He tried to remember the last time he had passed out mid-battle, but couldn’t think of anything else to say. “…How are you feeling?” 

“Fine.” She waved his question away, as if it was unimportant. “Where’s Ben?”

_Ben?_ It took Poe a moment to realize who she was talking about. _Oh. Kylo Ren._  “He’s here, in the base, being kept under constant watch.” He didn’t bother to keep them malice out of his voice.

Rey’s brows raised. “What? Is he okay?”

“Unharmed, just imprisoned.” Finn mentioned. “Rey… what happened out there? In the storm?”

Rey’s head collapsed back against the pillow, She went to sigh, but ended up clutching her side. Finn began to fret over her, but she waved him off. “I’m fine.”

Poe waited for her pain to subside, before pressing her again. “We need to know what happened out there. Finn told me Kylo Ren was mortally wounded, but when he saw you again, Ren was carrying you, on death’s door.”

Rey’s voice was weaker, quieter the next time she spoke. “Are we okay, though? …Did we win?”

Poe nodded. “Barely. Once the storm kicked in, the _Supremacy_  fled into hyperspace, and any First Order troops still outside didn’t infiltrate the base, probably died in the cold. We’re safe, for now.”

That seemed to satisfy Rey, at least for the time being, and she gave him a silent nod. “Good.”

Poe cleared his throat, knowing what came next. “Rey… I have to tell you.” He swallowed. “During the blast… we lost a lot of people. Good people, people valuable to us.” He paused, ignoring Rey hanging on to his every word. “Leia is gone.”

He could hear Rey’s breath go out of her in one long wind. Then, “…I think I knew. I could feel her, or the absence of her… the Force was a part of her. And it’s gone now… but I know she’s at peace. I can feel her.”

Poe didn’t know what to say to that. He only paused, flicking his gaze to Finn, then Rose, then Rey, who was studying her fingers.

“Does Ben know?” Rey finally continued.

“He was there when we found her.” Poe filled her in. “Connix says he was there, next to her, when she died.”

Rey looked as if she was about to ask something else, then changed the topic entirely, her face resolute. “I want to speak to him.”

“To _Kylo Ren_?” Poe was shocked, but when he looked to Finn for backup on this one, he was apparently the only one shocked by this turn of events.

“To Ben Solo.” Rey’s eyes were pools of fierce defense, yet calm serenity. “I won’t be swayed on this.”

“Poe,” Finn’s voice was low. “She’s our best bet of getting anything out of Ren. They’re… bonded.” The tone of voice Finn used made Poe’s skin crawl.

“No.” Poe’s mind was made up. “I’m sorry, but I can’t allow you to speak to him without telling us how you’re alive right now.”

Rey’s brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”

“What’s the last thing you remember, Rey? The last thing before waking up in this room.”

“I… I don’t know. I remember the snow, the storm, the explosion—“

“Did it happen outside?”

Rey nodded, her forehead still crinkled. “I know it was us, our power… but I don’t know how or why. The only explanation I can give you is the Force. And then Ben was unconscious, and I thought he was going to die…”

After a beat of silence, Poe spoke again. “Is that all you remember?”

Rey sighed, her eyes trained on her intertwined fingers. “I remember he was gravely injured, and he would die without help. I remember wanting him to be… not dead. And the Force showed me how. So I did it.”

“You healed his wounds.” Poe’s voice was flat; he wasn’t attempting to keep his disbelief hidden.

“It sounds crazy.” Rey defended herself. “But… that’s the last thing I remember.” She gestured to herself. “And then this.”

Poe nodded. “Fine. I believe you.” _Like I have any other choice._

“What’s going to happen to him?” Rey’s voice was shaking.

“We don’t know yet.” Poe had to turn away, shifting into his role as general and leader of the Resistance, rather than Rey’s friend. “We’ll have to complete our investigation of his role in the battle here on Hoth. Most likely, he’ll be shipped to Coruscant and face trial for war crimes, mass murder… typical First Order stuff.” A long bout of silence persisted between the group as Poe studied a broken control panel across the room. When he turned around, Rey’s eyes were trained on her fingernails, obviously keeping emotion back. Finn and Rose looked like they would rather be anywhere else besides this conversation.

“You can’t do that— you can’t try him.” Rey’s eyes were still downcast, but her tone was fierce, unflinching. “It’s not right.”

“It _is_ right, Rey; it’s justice.” When Rey’s eyes locked onto Poe’s, he looked away, raking a hand through his hair. “Honestly, it’s out of our control at this point. Even if I didn’t want him to see trial, the governing body at Coruscant would demand it.”

Rey flicked her gaze over to Finn, then Rose, asking for help, but both seemed reluctant to jump into the discussion. Finn even went so far as to hold his hands up, feigning innocence.

“You saw him— you both did, didn’t you?” Rey’s voice quieted, pleading any of them to empathize with her. “Before the battle ended. You know he’s not a monster— you’ve seen it.”

Poe interrupted before the discussion could derail any further. “I’ll arrange a meeting for the two of you when you’re well enough. After that, I expect he’ll be moved to a secure prison on Coruscant, where he can live out the rest of his days. And the Resistance will wipe its hands of him, once and for all.” Before Rey could respond, he turned on his heel and walked away from her, out of the med bay and back towards his quarters. The leader of the Resistance had better things to do than acquiesce to statements bordering on treason.

* * *

The reinforced durasteel walls of Kylo Ren’s prison were beginning to become mind-numbingly dull.

Ben sighed, glancing briefly at the inches-wide viewport on the jail cell’s door. The transparisteel peephole was no bigger than his palm, and was his only insight into the outside world. Without that confirmation that there were halls and rooms outside his cell, he could have been floating through deep space and not known the difference.

From his vantage point on the floor of the cramped cell, however, he couldn’t see much besides the snow-white ceiling of the halls outside. The presence of two guards emanated through the Force— nervous energy that tense was hard not to notice. He ignored it passively, resting the back of his head on the cold steel of his prison.

It had been his vantage point for the past three days— maybe four, it had been hard to keep track. He had initially opted for the cramped cot in the opposite corner, but the thing _must_ have been made for a smaller humanoid species. He barely fit, even with his knees pulled up to his chest, and he would wake hours later with a crick in his back even the Force couldn’t fix. That cot, and a dilapidated refresher, had been his only companions since arriving in his cell.

No, _arriving in his cell_ was too delicate a phrase for what had happened. But he couldn’t find the energy to describe it any other way. His mother was dead, his crippled army and their unscrupulous general stranding him here, and the Resistance’s new leader seemed intent on shipping him off to an eternity of imprisonment rather than involve him in the rebel group in any capacity.

His long-awaited redemption, it seemed, had come a moment too late.

He sighed, running his hand through his hair, concentrating his attention on the color of the walls, the texture. The pale blue color of the cot’s mattress, faded and fraying. The dented metal of the ‘fresher. The only things he allowed himself to focus on were his immediate surroundings; if he thought too long or too hard about the past few days, or his impending future, a life spent on trial and in prison cells—

He was a wreck, and he knew it. It would just take one bad pull, and he would unravel like thread.

As if on cue, he began to feel the presence of someone else, through the Force— nervous like the guards, but in a different way. He recognized the sensation, knew who it was even before the muffled discussion and the noisy whirr of the door opening. 

_Rey._

He forced his thoughts into line, schooling his features into a mask of calm indifference, but still tears threatened to spring loose, wild emotion simmering just below the surface. He had to look away from her when she initially entered, for fear of coming undone, but her presence— physically, through the Force, through _everything_ , brought his gaze back to her.

She was better than when he saw her last— on death’s door, incapacitated from healing his own fatal wounds. Still, she wasn’t yet back to being the girl he had sparred with on Starkiller, spry and agile and quick on her feet, always on the move. Now, he noticed one hand pressed against her ribs, the other leaning on the bed's metal post for support, before finally settling on the cot.

He didn't know what to say, what to do. He didn't think she knew, either.

Eventually, after he didn't know how much time had passed, he spoke the only two words his mind could create. “I’m sorry.”

Rey let the apology hang between the two of them, floating in the stagnant air of his cell, before responding. “For what?” Her brow was creased in confusion, her eyes genuine.

He barely lifted his hand in gesture, breaking her gaze. “Everything. How it all happened.” He cleared his throat, struggling to keep his composure. “And I guess I should thank you. For saving my worthless life.”

“Ben…” 

There it was, just the three letters of his name in her mouth, the person he should have always been, the person he was to her— that was enough to make him crumble. He couldn't keep it at bay up for long—and before he could comprehend his own actions his head was buried in her lap, arms wrapping around her back and gripping her sides and snaking up her shoulders, as if he can’t hold her enough— which was stupid, her tiny form in his own massive grasp— and he was holding onto her like a life raft in a sea storm, but she knew what to do— as if she’d always known, born with an innate knowledge of how to see him— she held him right back, her fingers burying themselves in his hair, then her cheek pressing against his head. Sobs racked his body, and she sobbed with him— and it wasn’t just the cell, or his mother, or the battle, it was  _everything_ , starting from that split second of forest-green illuminating his bedroom at the temple school, or maybe even the first time Snoke spoke to his mind. Every slight, every wrong, every betrayal, every _mistake_ flickerered through his mind like photos falling through his fingers, moving too fast to catch.

“I forgive you,” She whispered, inches away from his ear. Her hands fell from his hair to rest on his cheeks, wresting his face up to look at hers. Even with tears slicking her face and blotching her skin, she was a vision; calm, serene beauty graces her smile. “I forgive it _all_ ; I accept it. I accept all of you— Kylo Ren, Ben Solo, and everyone you are in between.”

He shook his head— a minute movement, with his face held between her palms. “It’s too late.” Emotion broke his voice in two. “This is the future I’ve crafted for myself, the grave I’ve dug. I’ve earned the sentence of spending the rest of my life in a place like this. _Reflecting_  on my sins.”

Rey was shaking her head before he’d even finished. “No, you haven’t.” Somewhere along the way, his hands had ended up in her lap, and she reached down to grab them now, intertwining her thin fingers with his own. “You’re not going to die in a cell, Ben Solo. You’re going to live.” Slowly, she extended one of her hands behind her, pulling something from the folds of her tunic.

“Why?”

Polished metal, cool against his palm.

“Because I won’t without you.”

When he looked down, the hilt of his lightsaber was in his hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooo here's the final chapter before the epilogue. I felt a little unsure about the ending (which is why it took a month to churn this baby out, sorry about that lol) but I hope everything wraps up nicely in the last chapter, which I'm already in the process of writing. Hopefully there isn't such a long pause between this chapter and the next one as there was between this and the last chapter. Thank you all _so so_ much for reading and commenting-- your support is what makes writing this so easy.
> 
> I also just wanna quickly say that I've already started work on my next fic, which will also be Rey/Kylo-centric and loosely based on Hades and Persephone. It's part of the reason this chapter took so long to write-- I'm so eager to get this new work out there that I've completely neglected my old one! I'm 10,000 words in and still have so much more to do; this one is gonna be looooong (but in a good way, I think). I don't wanna give myself a deadline to upload it, but when the first chapter is done I will definitely link it in the notes of the epilogue (you can also subscribe to my pseud to be notified when it's up). Again I'm so grateful to you guys, sorry for the long end note, I love you all!!


	10. X: Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _It wasn’t in her nature to run and hide; she had always been a fighter, always._

Dawn light filtered through their grimy window, and hit the hazel of Rey’s eyes, like flint breeding flame.

Twenty years of scavenging had instilled in Rey an internal chronometer that always woke her up before the sun rose, her instincts screaming at her to get out into the desert. Early scavengers usually got the best pieces— and the best prices, not to mention the added bonus of finishing before the sun had peaked in the sky, bearing its deathly heat down on the planet.

In the Resistance, she had used this extra time to her advantage, exploring empty passageways of bases and ships, or meditating, channeling her newfound relationship with the Force. Now, though, she could only wait.

Next to her, Ben slept fitfully-- as if there was any other way. His brow was furrowed, lips pursing and unpursing, as he battled enemies in dreams. 

She had been laying against him when she had woken up, her back flush against his torso as his arms held her to him, but had carefully extracted herself to use the ‘fresher. Now, she laid facing him, watching him fight wakefulness. Somewhere along the way his hand had passed the invisible barrier now between them— her on one side of the bed, him on the other— and she had grasped it. Even deep in sleep, he had squeezed her hands, intertwining his fingers with hers. It had brought a sad smile to her face, the idea that he was so hungry for any connection that even when unconscious, his instincts told him to reach out.

She was examining their hands intertwined when he started, eyes opening with a sense of panicked urgency. When they found her face though, resting on the pillows, they instantly relaxed, blinking shut before a groan emitted from his form.

“Good morning.” Her voice was quiet, a careful smile playing on her lips.

His hand pulled at hers. “You’re so far away.”

Rey scooted closer to his body, still facing him as she pressed her head to the space between his shoulder and his bicep. His arm extended, then wrapped around her, pressing her closer to him as his hand raked through her unkempt hair, his other arm wrapping around her midsection. Her own hand rested lightly on his chest, and she felt him plant a kiss on her forehead before her eyes fluttered shut again.

She thought they were done fighting, that escaping the rebel base would be their final battle before a life of solace. But they fought all the same— fighting to survive, fighting to keep their distance from the forces that wanted them dead. They had both pledged allegiance to their respective clans— her the Resistance, him the First Order— but somewhere along the way it had gotten all muddled up, and now they were enemies of both. Enemies of _everyone_ , it seemed. 

Florrum was notorious for its slew of pirate gangs running the planet, but on Jakku, Rey had heard that someone there could be granted a safe house, emergency escape ship, and, most importantly, silence from the citizens. It was an ideal place for fugitives to wait out the enemy, and the Weequay pirates living there full time knew better than to rat out any temporary residents to the government. This practice had kept the planet alive through Republic, then Empire, then Republic again. It had been the first place Rey had suggested after she had made her escape with Ben. With no credits and a hefty bounty, the pirates hadn’t been able to do much better than providing a metal hut, beaten by sandstorms for longer than Rey had been alive, a good distance away from the Weequay headquarters. It was small— with barely enough room for a mattress on the floor, a broken ‘fresher, and a low table by the door— and unprotected, but isolated.

She was surviving, yes. But Rey hated all this hiding.

It wasn’t in her nature to run and hide; she had always been a fighter, always. And it certainly wasn’t in her nature to hide from people she loved, people she called friends. Since arriving on Florrum, she had tried very hard not to think about them— about the members of the Resistance at all. Ben had taken to characterizing the whole group as their _enemy_ , just as he characterized the First Order, and Rey didn’t have the heart to argue with him on it.

“Is it worth it, do you think?” Rey’s voice was small, nervous, as if even speaking it into existence would shatter their tiny fantasy, contained only between the two of them. “ All this running?”

“If we weren’t running, I’d be dead.” Ben murmured into her hair, hardly a trace of emotion gracing his tone.“Or imprisoned, indefinitely.”

_And me? Where would I be?_  Rey tried not to think about that, either. It was worth it, she decided on an impulse. Change was hard; even leaving Jakku had taken a courage beyond her initial desire to stay where her parents could find her.

“And I’d rather be here than dead. Or locked up.” 

The words were small, nonchalant, but her chest still constricted, involuntarily, and she felt her hand fist in the sheets.

“Me too.”

It’s these quiet exchanges that have kept them going over the past few weeks of hiding— reminders of why they’re here, everything they gave up for this. Ben pressed another kiss to her forehead, and Rey nuzzled closer to him, her nose breathing in the scent of him as she did.

He opened his mouth to say something when Rey’s stomach interrupted him, growling out her hunger. Ben’s own words shortened out into a short exhale of breath, what could be described as a chuckle, if it had come from anyone else. Rey started to unwrap herself from the sheets, from Ben’s grasp, when he placed a hand on her torso to still her. “Shh. I’ll get it.”

The portions on Florrum were strikingly similar to those on Jakku— same tasteless polystarch and vegmeat, dehydrated and vacuum-packaged into little baggies. Eating them had initially made her nostalgic, homesick for her little overturned AT-AT a thousand planets away, but she had readjusted to their bland lack of taste or texture after a few packs. Ben took just one pack from the meager stack on their table now— they were splitting portions, per Rey’s suggestion, in case the Weequay pirates sheltering them arbitrarily decided to cut them off— and ripped it open, upending the contents into a small metal bowl. Rey watched him work from the bed across the tiny room with her head pillowed by her arms, as he poured a few drops of water from a canister in to make a mixture. She couldn’t count the number of early mornings she had yearned for someone to make her breakfast; now that her wish had come true, she felt almost guilty being waited on. Laying back while someone else did all the work was not something she was used to. Still, it was nice. 

The polystarch reacted accordingly, rising up into a little ball of gray bread. Ben took the bowl in one hand, the water canister in another, and joined her back on the mattress, tucking one leg underneath him while the other splayed out on the floor. Rey sat up, grabbing a pillow and crossing her legs, as Ben took the bread roll in his hands and tore it down the middle, handing one piece to her and biting into the other. They both picked at their respective pieces slowly, eating crumb by crumb, making their meal last as long as possible. 

“So, I was thinking…” Rey said between bites. “You should try your hand at scavenging today.”

Ben stopped cold. “Absolutely not.”

“Come on. I can’t do it all on my own.”

With no other way to scrounge up credits, Rey had turned to the one thing she had known before anything else. There were a few downed speeders here and there— Rey had even come across a Republic Y-Wing one day— that Rey had managed to extract old scraps from. The pirates wouldn’t exchange the parts for money— they had laughed in her face at the offering, which had nearly brought Ben’s wrath— but they claimed a ship dealer came through their trading post once every standard month, looking for old parts to repair his wares with. Rey had begun a stockpile of scraps outside their hut, patiently awaiting the day that dealer would come. Until then, they were relying on the shaky hospitality— and protection— from the Weequay.

Ben sighed, leaning back on one of his hands, pressed palm-first into the mattress. “I don’t like the sand.”

Before she could come up with a retort, she heard something— or felt it, through the Force— just steps outside their shack’s door. Rey’s eyes flicked to Ben, and she knew he felt it too, that fresh panic simmering to the surface for both of them. He began rising from the bed, as if to check what was waiting for them beyond the door, but Rey grabbed his wrist, staying his entire form. “I’ll look.” The unspoken reason resonated between them: _You’re the escaped prisoner. I’m just the accomplice._

She peeled herself from the mattress, summoning Ben’s crossguarded saber —much more reliable than Skywalker’s broken one— to her hand as a precaution. Ben maintained his position as he rotated to face the door, cautious eyes trained on Rey.

When she was close enough, Rey pressed herself against the metal walls, then, half a moment later, used the pad of a single finger to wrench open the door just an inch, enough to peek out. Then she sighed, bowing her head for just an instant, but it was enough.

“What? What is it?” Ben’s voice was panicked, his tone rising. It only took a warning hand from Rey for him to quiet down.

“First Order troops.” She whispered, keeping one eye trained on the squadron. It was no more than a handful of sandtroopers, and a commanding officer, currently surveying their escape craft.  _Probably verifying, making sure they tracked the right one._

Rey heard the unmistakable _zoom_  of the Skywalker lightsaber igniting in Ben’s hand, and gripped the crossguard hilt in her own. The troopers must have heard the sound, too, because a few heads perked up, looking towards the shack. That was Rey’s cue to back away, close the door, lighting her own saber. Instinctively, she placed herself between Ben, who was beginning to stand behind her now, and the door, the people outside, everything but them. She heard footsteps, and then a knock on the metal of the door.

_“Ready?”_

And then they fought.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Epilogue snuggles based on this amazing artwork](https://drawingreylo-szikee.tumblr.com/post/169984070438/reylo-snuggles-morning-and-night-versions)  
>  WARNING LONG END NOTE AHEAD  
> So that's it!! I'm gonna be honest, I definitely got stuck with the ending and it's not my best but I just wanted to finish this story so you all could enjoy it in its entirety, and there's no better way to do that than with some domestic Reylo (well, as domestic as they get) turning into us-against-the-world Reylo. I've considered creating an on-the-run story with these two, so I kind of left this one open-ended for that potentially? We shall see.
> 
> I can't thank all of you enough for reading. Despite writing ff for five years, for so many different subjects, this is the first multichapter work I've ever fully completed, start to finish, and I hope it's not the last! All of your likes and comments were definitely the fuel that kept me going through the ups and downs of creating this. As for future stuff, I have about 3 chapters of my new multichapter written (still need to be edited/titled/published, and I'm still potentially looking for a beta?) which I hope to start uploading in May-- as soon as it's up, I'll link it here as well. I'm also working on a longer work for the Reylo FF Anthology happening on tumblr which I'll upload here in September.
> 
> Thanks again, you guys!! I love you all.


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